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"I don't want to hear any whining, complaining or arguing. Out, now!" Kelly, Joanna's next door neighbor, called to her two young children.
Ignoring their mother, both kids hollered to Joanna as she entered, "Hi, Ms. Leonard!"
Joanna waved at them as Kelly looked up and said, "Hi, Jo! Lucky you, the the hot tub is working perfectly, and I'm taking the little monsters home now. You've got it all to yourself, for, oh," Kelly looked up at the clock, "a whole fifteen minutes, or until lockup, whichever comes first."
Joanna smiled back. Kelly and the kids were the best thing to happen to Joanna in the last year. Kelly noticed everyone and everything, and had something funny to say about it later. Joanna was always willing to listen. They hit it off immediately. Joanna had watched the kids a few times when Kelly's baby-sitter canceled. Lately, Kelly had loaned Joanna books. Joanna didn't know Kelly's husband Dave yet; he worked some weird shift at Boeing and was either asleep or at work whenever Joanna was at home.
"Aw, Mom. It's not ten yet. Can't we have five more minutes?" Jared wheedled.
Joanna had shucked her robe, dropping it and her towel on a chair. Kelly glanced at Joanna as she walked towards the hot tub, where the two kids splashed noisily. "I know it's better without the kids. Do you mind another five minutes?"
Joanna set her water bottle to the side of the hot tub and walked over to the door to the pool. Opening it, she looked at the surface of the water. Turning back to Kelly, she said, "I don't mind. The pool's clear, and I could use some exercise. My boss took me to lunch today, so I ate too much and I didn't go walking then."
Both kids yelled, "Thanks, Ms. Leonard!" Joanna walked over to the pool and, ignoring the No Diving sign, did a flat dive into the pool. While the kids gloried in their extra five minutes, Joanna did a rapid ten laps in the small pool. Hauling herself out of the pool after her last lap, she saw Kelly hustling her kids out of the spa. Joanna opened the door to go back in.
While the kids were drying off, Joanna said to Kelly, "I finished another one of your books. I can return it whenever you like."
"Don't worry about it. Like I said, when you're done with the box, return them all together, or, if you like, pass them along to a friend. I've reread those as much as I'm going to. Did you like it?"
Joanna thought about it. The novels were addictive. She hadn't read a romance since high school, until Kelly brought a box of them over and insisted on leaving them with her. They were better than she had expected, but worried that might sound insulting to Kelly. Instead, she said, "It went fast. I laughed out loud several times, and I loved the dialogue. I wish I were that witty. I don't think of things that clever to say even hours later when I'm alone."
Kelly responded, "You're better off than the rest of us. We say things we'd give anything to take back later. You sound sensible when you open your mouth."
"Thanks, I think," said Joanna.
"Come on, you two. Time to go." Kelly took Jared by the hand, letting Tyler run ahead across the parking lot. Joanna waved goodbye as the door closed behind them.
"Peace at last," she whispered as she stepped into the hot tub. But she said it too soon. The door behind Kelly didn't close completely before opening again.
From the balcony, Hale sipped a beer and watched Joanna walk towards the pool. In blatant disregard for the posted rules, she dove into the pool. Her form was perfect; she would never break her neck diving too deep into a shallow pool. She surfaced. He watched her swim a few laps, her hair sleek against her head. She wore a black, one-piece tank swim suit with a low back. Her form in swimming was also good, producing so little foam that he could distinctly see her arms and shoulders. He wished he were downstairs, where he could see the play of muscle across her back.
As he watched her exercise, he thought about the last month. He had been so sure he would be able to immediately return to work, and his usual routines between assignments, that he had made no effort to adapt his exercise routine to The Retreat. Other than his morning rambles, and the effort expended cleaning up his unit, he'd done nothing physical.
At first, it had been a relief, and he hadn't felt any change in his body. Despite all the advice inflicted on him over the years by friends, especially John, he'd never planned rest days from his workout routines. As strenuous as assignments sometimes were, they were usually less strenuous than his workout routine. His body had needed this rest. But he ought to start doing something, if he was going to be stuck here for another month. Between the weight room and the pool, he had no excuse.
Joanna hauled herself out of the pool in one smooth motion. She was as graceful out of the water as she was in the water. He watched her walk back in, his mind jumping from one workout to another. He banished those thoughts after a brief, mesmerized moment. He was too old for her, and his life too violent and unpredictable for any woman. But that didn't mean he couldn't have a little fun. He went into his apartment, grabbed the suit and towel he had left by his door, then jogged downstairs. He reached the front door of the spa as another tenant and her two kids walked out.
"Hey, the pool is clear, and the spa doesn't smell funny at all. How'd you do that?" asked the woman.
Hale grimaced, and answered, "I fired the maintenance crew and fixed it myself."
"Well, thanks! It was great, and we really appreciate it. I'll see you tomorrow when I drop off the rent check, I guess. Have a good night!" Hale was startled to see her wink at him.
Hale said, "Good night!", to her back as she chased across the parking lot after her kids. Just a moment or two before ten, he entered the spa.
Joanna and Hale looked each other over. She glanced up at the clock. It was almost ten. "Are you locking up now?" As soon as she had blurted out her question, she wished she hadn't. He might not have known what time it was, and the suit and towel he carried suggested he was planning on soaking or swimming. "I hope not. I only just got in."
"I know," said Hale, wishing immediately he could take back his words. He sounded like a psycho stalker, watching where she went and what she did. "I can hear what happens down here, since I live right upstairs and the echoes magnify the sound."
Joanna arched an eyebrow at that. She doubted he could recognize her voice. He must have meant that he knew someone had come in recently and not left with Kelly and the kids.
Hale didn't know why she was looking at him that way, but he continued. "Anyway, don't worry. I won't kick you out until I leave, but I am going to lock the doors so I don't have to get rid of anyone else later." Setting his beer and towel down beside hers, he saw her flip-flops. Curious, he picked one up. The plastic insole was honeycombed with cushioning air bubbles, and small holes to drain water and sand to the sole and out the sides. "Nice." He turned it over and read the sole. "Italian. Wow. I did not know you could buy Italian flip-flops." He put it back under the chair. Glancing at Joanna, he saw her blush.
"They aren't the most expensive ones. Those were only $25. I've seen them in catalogs for over $200."
Hale walked over to the door to lock it. He slipped his card key through the swipe, then punched in a code. It beeped to confirm the door would no longer allow tenant card key access to the spa. Anyone inside could still get out, of course, since the fire code required panic hardware on the doors. Turning back, he commented, "It's not how much something costs that matters. It's how much it costs each time you use it. If you use something a lot, it makes sense to spend money on it." Joanna nodded, and the blush receded to an all-over, heat-induced flush. Very attractive. Encouraged, he continued. "You wouldn't believe how much money my friend Brad is willing to spend on knives." That sounded bad. "And other kitchen equipment," he added hastily. He wasn't sure that was much better. Before he could say anything else scary, Hale went into the men's changing room to put on his suit.
When he returned, he dropped his street clothes on a chair by the wall. As he walked over, she saw that unlike many men, his legs were well developed. Hale wasn't the type to focus on his upper body and ignore the rest. She asked, "Is your friend a chef?" She tried not to stare at his upper arms as he lowered himself into the hot tub.
"Not yet," he answered. "Brad got out of the service a few years ago. That's how I know him. He's a bartender now, but he cooks during the day. It's more than a hobby, almost an obsession. When he found out I was in the area for a while, he brought over food to put in my freezer. He does that for another buddy of ours, too."
"That's neat. Homemade frozen dinners. Like having a personal chef, only free. Or do you pay him?"
Hale shook his head. "No, he won't take money for the groceries. He says he'd cook all that food anyway, and it would go to waste."
"How did he get interested in cooking?" asked Joanna.
"He's never given me a straight answer on that. Sometimes I wonder if he knows himself. I found out once when we were working together. Imagine you're camping, that's close enough. You've got some food, maybe a pan. A fire, and a bunch of rocks and crap propped up to support the pan -- no real pit, no grill, no stove. I still don't know where he scrounged the eggs. They were too small to be chicken eggs. But he managed to turn out this incredible omelet out of food he's found, including some mushrooms."
"You ate wild mushrooms?"
"If you'd smelled that omelet, you would have too. He swore up one side and down the other he'd been through the area several times before with guides who told him what to look for and what to avoid."
"I take it he doesn't just cook in the woods, either."
"When we finished the job, we had leave in Bangkok for a few days. He told me we were going to go bar hopping, but half the places we stopped at were street vendors, usually with some kind of portable fryer or grill and some kind of meat you don't really want to know where it came from. When they weren't too busy, Brad would ask them what spices they used and how they prepped the food they cooked on the street. They all laughed at him, but some of them told him, with a lot of lies thrown in for good measure. The next day, he swore he knew this great place to get a hangover cure, and along the way he dragged me to a bunch of markets to buy food so he could experiment."
"Did you ever get the hangover cure? And did it work?"
"Ha! There really is no such thing. Bunch of water, hair of the dog and maybe some aspirin is as good as it gets. All those hot sauce concoctions do is distract you from the other pain."
"Brad lives here now? Does he still cook that kind of food?"
"He cooks everything he likes. He bitched a lot when he first got out of the service about how hard it was to find ingredients, but he says it's gotten a lot easier."
"All the Thai, Korean and Vietnamese restaurants have to buy their food somewhere, right?"
"Exactly."
"He should be a chef, shouldn't he?" Joanna mused.
"He should go to cooking school. He could work his way up from there."
"But then you wouldn't get the free gourmet frozen food. Tough dilemma," Joanna said, smiling. "When did you leave the service?"
Hale saw her eyes go to his hair, still very short. He contemplated telling her a month ago, but told her something closer to the truth. "I'm on a long leave right now."
"Oh." Joanna wasn't sure if she should ask, or if it might be personal, or medical, and too private to share with a stranger. Hale didn't volunteer an answer, so she tried another tack. "Do you have much time to pursue hobbies or other interests?" It sounded awkward to her. Getting to know someone new was so hard. She never knew the right thing to say, and she always felt like she asked too many questions.
"I get to do a lot of different things as part of my work. I spend most of my time off reading."
Joanna felt Hale close off to her. If he didn't want to answer questions, she could volunteer some information. Maybe he would open up to the right topic. "I started diving last year. I got my open water certification."
"I've done a little diving, although not recreationally. It's cold in the water out here, isn't it? Did you use a dry suit?" Hale asked.
"No, but I think I'm going to do a weekend course for dry suit next. It is cold, even with a thick wet suit. I want to go to Hawaii some time, or maybe Mexico. Anywhere the water's warm. Where have you been diving?"
"A lot of places. It was work. Speaking of diving and warm, I'm going to cool off with a lap or two in the pool. Want to join me?" Hale stopped himself before he could comment on how flushed she looked.
He might not want to talk, Joanna thought, but he seemed to like having her around. "Sounds good. It is very warm in here." He gestured for her to precede him out of the hot tub. She padded out of the building, grabbing her water bottle on the way. She took a swig, and set it by the pool before squatting down and dropping over the edge into the pool.
"No dive this time?" Hale asked.
Joanna walked backwards, watching him enter the pool. "Were you watching me earlier?" she asked.
Hale said, "Yes," and then started swimming crawl across the pool. Joanna paralleled him with a breast stroke.
When he paused in the deep end, treading water, Joanna floated next to him. She'd tried three different times to get Hale to open up and talk about himself: when he'd left the service, his hobbies, diving. His answers had been short and evasive. She was used to people opening up to her. This felt strange, and alone after hours with a big, strong, unfamiliar man, it worried her. "You're evading a lot of my questions." It sounded blunt, even by her own standards of direct, concise speech, but she wasn't prepared to take it back. She was used to people who didn't talk much. Lord knew she worked with some of the least talkative people who still held down a job and paid their own bills. Programmers could be a silent lot at times. But Hale was selectively silent; he was willing to talk, but not about himself.
"I didn't evade that one," Hale responded. Joanna rolled her eyes. "Some of your questions I can't answer. You'll have to trust me on that. The questions I can answer, I will, as honestly and completely as appropriate. Deal?"
Joanna thought the wording left a lot of weasel room. Who determined appropriate? She shrugged, and accepted, "Deal. It's cold out here. I'm going back inside where it's warm."
Hale responded by hauling himself out at the side of the pool. She might have doubts about this guy, but not about his body. The lights in the pool provided a rippled reflection in the water sheeting off his well-muscled back. When Hale glanced back to see if she needed assistance, he saw her treading water, her eyes just above the surface of the water, staring at him thoughtfully. Or was that lustfully? He wasn't sure, but he suspected the latter.
She broke first, and stroked to the other end of the pool, walking out on the shallow steps. They hurried back through the cool night air, back to the steamy warmth of the spa, descending gratefully into the warmth of the hot tub. After reveling in the heat for a moment, Joanna asked, "You said you like to read in your spare time. Have you read anything good lately?"
"Depends on how you define good. I'm reading a book my friend John loaned me. John teaches martial arts and he's always reading about some new style or teaching technique. I don't know if you're familiar with this kind of book," Joanna shook her head no, "but the people who write them tend to be either very good at, or very obsessed with, a technique."
Joanna laughed. "I can imagine the quality of the writing that results. What kind of bad is it: too long or too short?"
"Both! It has great stories, which stray far from the point, but details on teaching the material are sketchy. The subject matter makes it difficult: adrenal stress conditioning." He paused to let her volunteer whether she knew anything about the subject. When she waited patiently, he continued. "When someone attacks you, your body reacts by dumping adrenaline into your bloodstream, so you'll be able to hit harder and move faster. Unfortunately, before the shakes set in, adrenaline affects your perception. Your vision narrows; you don't know how hard you're hitting. You don't feel pain as much. In a fight, punches becomes wild swings. Sophisticated attacks are almost impossible to counter." He paused again, uncertain whether she was interested.
Joanna felt a warm surge of happiness. Hale was giving her enough time to respond to what he was saying. "If it's about conditioning, does that mean I could learn to compensate?"
"Yes. Like any altered state, we have to practice doing ordinary things while in that state, the way we learned to walk and talk normally after drinking alcohol. The first few times are weird, but most people adapt quickly."
"How does a teacher trigger adrenaline in a student? By scaring them?"
"Yes. Screaming obscenities, getting too close, making oneself appear large, attacking."
"We did some stuff like that in a self-defense course I took a long time ago. But they didn't explain the response the way you did. I did okay. Some of the women froze; they couldn't attack. I had no problem attacking, but after I left, I almost fell asleep at the wheel. Is that part of the reaction, too?"
"It can be. So can crying or laughing, too. Or talking uncontrollably."
Joanna laughed, "A great ice breaker!"
"Movies use it all the time," Hale agreed.
"Books, too," Joanna added.
"What have you been reading?" Hale asked. She was already flushed from the heat of the water, but he thought she was blushing.
"My neighbor unloaded a box of cheap paperbacks on me. I've been working my way through them.
Joanna paused, uncertain whether she wanted to tell him what she'd been reading. "I read science fiction and fantasy, and nonfiction. Kelly loaned me a box of romances, and I hadn't read any of those since I was a little kid." She laughed, remembering. "I used to sneak them out of the box in my mom's closet. I don't know if she ever caught me. They used to be tamer then."
Hale asked, "Could your mom have been avoiding the, er, juicy ones?" As soon as he said it, he knew he shouldn't have. But she answered his question immediately. He breathed a sigh of relief.
"Nope. I asked Kelly that, and she had me describe what I remembered of the covers. She says those were about as far out there as existed in romance novels at the time. She also says there are more types of romance novels. Some of the ones she loaned me were close to the fantasy novels I read."
"Do you like them?" asked Hale. It wasn't a topic he'd ever given any thought to, but Joanna felt strongly about them. He could hear it in her voice, and in the long pauses as she carefully chose her words.
Joanna made a complicated gesture, shaking her head slightly, while smiling, and waving one hand dismissively. "I don't know about like. They fascinate me. Some of the stereotypes make me so angry. But it's refreshing to read a book that focuses on the development of relationships, and not just romantic ones, but family, and friends and a whole network of people helping each other through difficult spots, and being there to celebrate the good things in life. The other fiction I read is all about action, or depicting a different world or a different way of life."
"Interesting." Hale tried to imagine a novel about relationships. He failed. He wondered if that was a flaw in him. Shrugging, he asked, "Why did Kelly loan you a bunch of books you don't usually read?"
Joanna rolled her eyes. "She's always nagging at me to date. I told her I hadn't been out in a long time, didn't know what the rules were, or how to meet people. That, to Kelly, is a problem in search of a solution. She told me to watch some late night TV, and read this box of books."
"Late night TV? Like what?" Hale asked, while thinking to himself that if she hadn't been out on a date in a long time, he might have a chance after all. As soon as he thought it, he mentally slapped himself, almost missing her response.
"You would not believe it. Stuff like Blind Date. I bet you've never heard of this show."
"That is a bet you would lose," he responded emphatically. "I'm an insomniac. Even discounting the possibility of nearly naked women in hot tubs, Roger Lodge is much less annoying than Ron Popeil." What was wrong with him? Twice he had blurted out stupid things likely to offend a woman. First asking Joanna about her mother's taste in romance novels, now with the naked women comments.
But Joanna didn't mind. She laughed. "If it isn't just the naked women, do you know who Chris Jagger is?"
"That'd be Change of Heart, and with DateCam, there are nearly naked women on that show, too." Hale was exploring the boundaries of what would amuse Joanna, and what might offend her. He asked, "Do you know who Graham Elwood is?"
"Oooh, I know that one. That's not the guy on Street Smarts, who is that. Oh, that's Strip Poker. That's kind of lame. They just layer on more and more under things. Boring."
Apparently, beneath the exterior woman-of-few-words lurked a passionate and open-minded woman. He was careful not to show any surprise. Instead, he said, "The Street Smarts guy is Frank Nicotero."
"That's right. I love the way he puts on clothes to match the people on the street he's talking to. He does drag sometimes."
Hale had no idea what to say to that. Instead, he suggested a name he was sure she wouldn't get, the host of a particularly vile show called Studs that hadn't been on the air for ten years. "How about Mark DeCarlo?"
Joanna looked at him blankly. "I have no idea. Who is that?"
Hale had to say something, and he did not want to explain Studs. That dating show had involved two contestants dating three panelists, then trying to identify what statement about a contestant came from which panelist. The statements usually required intimate knowledge of the panelist to answer. Thinking quickly, he remembered that DeCarlo was currently on the air on another show. "One of a few regulars on the X-Show. Just tossed that in to see if you were encyclopedic, or just amazing."
"Ah," responded Joanna. Hale wasn't telling her something, but she was too warm from the hot tub to dig for it now. She pulled herself up to sit at the side of the hot tub, dangling her legs in the water. "Who is Ron Popeil?"
"He sells stuff on late night TV."
"Like what? Bizarre exercise gear? Compilations of music we didn't like twenty years ago, but someone hopes has sentimental appeal now?"
Hale laughed. "No. Useless kitchen equipment. Portable sporting goods."
Joanna frowned. She felt a little dizzy from the heat, but she should still have been able to understand what Hale was talking about. "Hunh?"
"Currently, he's hawking a miniature rotisserie. In the past, he's sold things like Hair in a Can, and the Pocket Fisherman."
"Okay, I believe you, but I'm too warm for this to make any sense. I'm going to cool down in the pool for a few minutes." Joanna stood up and walked out the doors to the pool. Hale chuckled as he followed her.
"Trust me. It won't make any more sense after you've cooled off, either."
The alternation of the heat and cold had relaxed Joanna more than the sake. She no longer felt as awkward as she usually did when talking to someone she didn't know very well. When Hale asked, "What do you do?," she answered without her usual hesitation.
"I manage a small group at Taille Electronics, but I might be switching jobs." She saw Hale's eyebrow quirk up. "My manager is going to Seattle, to work at Abracadabra.com, and she says she will get me a job there with her."
"Aren't you worried about whether they'll survive? I thought they were having trouble financially."
"That's what I asked her, but she isn't worried. She says it's easier to find other jobs down there than up here, and based on my friends' experience, I think she's right. I called a couple of head hunters today to get a feel for what else is available."
"Sounds like a good idea. Do you have any ties up here? Family?"
"I didn't grow up here. I stayed in the area after I went to college in Seattle. Most of my friends are in Seattle." Joanna's short, cynical laugh surprised Hale. "I was going to move next month, but I don't want to sign another lease up here, so I guess I'm staying."
"I think it'll get better," Hale said reassuringly. He didn't want her to leave. Not before he had a chance to get to know her.
"It is better," Joanna said emphatically. "The hot tub doesn't stink."
Hale grinned. "How little it takes to make us happy. I think the dumpster situation should be better soon, and Landscaping is coming out next week."
"Great," Joanna said. After another lull, they returned to the hot tub. Joanna continued, "It isn't just the apartment. I didn't like it here; I didn't like my job, but I didn't hate either one. But with my boss moving on, I realized my life is on hold, at least compared to my friends. They all have new jobs and new boyfriends and interesting hobbies and they travel to weird places. I've been working at the same place since I graduated from college. I'm going on my first date in two years tomorrow. I haven't taken any vacation time in over three years. When people ask me if I have any hobbies, I can't think of anything to say. I don't think that working out or swimming or reading counts. I go hiking sometimes in the summer, but I'm not a rock climber or anything like that. I feel so. . . boring."
Hale wanted to pry details out of her about the date. He felt a sharp, unexpected surge of jealousy that, as he was getting to know her, a potential rival loomed. But if it was her first date in years, it couldn't be serious. He wanted to protest that she wasn't boring at all. She was a warm, caring person who was very accepting. He knew from past experience that the only women willing to put up with him were women who didn't give a damn about what he did, and never bothered to ask. He'd never met a woman who tried to get to know him, and understand his life -- they always ran away when he didn't open up and tell all his secrets, most of which weren't his to share. He settled for saying, "You don't bore me. I like talking to you. I hope you come down near closing tomorrow." He sounded blunt. He didn't know how to sound comforting. He'd never wanted to sound comforting before.
"That's sweet. Thank you! You're the second person today to say they liked talking to me. Amy says I listen well."
"You do, but you also ask interesting questions."
"When I get a chance! Usually I'm too slow to say anything." Joanna paused. She was shocked that she would consider canceling her date to spend more time in the hot tub with Hale. She shook her head, trying to clear it. "I can't come down tomorrow night, since I'm going out, but maybe Sunday night." Hale nodded in acknowledgement. Joanna said, "I think I'm going to get out, now. I'm so relaxed I'm about to pass out. I'll see you tomorrow, if you're in the office collecting rent."
"Have a good night," Hale called after her as she walked into the women's changing room, picking up her robe along the way. He wondered briefly if he had frightened her away. He thought he had surprised her, but she had said she would come down on Sunday. He would have to be patient. With any luck at all, her blind date tomorrow night would go the way his blind dates always had, and their age difference would seem like a minor problem compared to whatever was wrong with her date.
Stepping out of the hot tub, he wrapped his towel around him, grabbed his clothes and went upstairs to his unit. For once, he felt no desire for another beer before going to sleep. After a quick shower, he flopped down and fell immediately asleep.
After a quick shower to rinse off the tiny amount of chlorine, Joanna pulled on her robe and slid into her flip-flops. Grinning to herself, she remembered Hale's admiration of her shoes. Who knew what would catch a guy's eye? As she returned to her apartment, she thought back over their conversation. Should she have said it had been a long time since she'd been on a date? Maybe that made her sound undesirable, or too psycho for anyone to want to date. Then again, she'd mentioned she was going out tomorrow night. Would he wonder at the inconsistency? Should she have said that the date was a blind date, that she didn't think she'd be interested in whoever her idiot cousin had found? Or would that have made him think she was insanely picky, too proud to give a guy a chance? Her pragmatic half pointed out to her that for all she knew, Hale was some psycho stalker, not in the military at all, but a serial murderer who took jobs at apartments minimally overseen by absentee landlords, the better to find his next victims. She felt sure he wasn't, but she couldn't think why.
When she got back to her apartment, she shucked her robe and put her suit in the bathroom sink to soak. She debated briefly with herself about taking a shower, and decided she didn't need to. She had to wash her hair tomorrow anyway for her date, and she didn't think there were enough chemicals in either the spa or the pool to make her itch.
Still mentally debating why she trusted Hale, her phone rang, surprising her. No one called her after midnight, which was a pity, since she never felt like talking until very late. Exhaustion relaxed her inhibitions and nervousness more than alcohol. She picked up the phone, thinking it must be a wrong number.
"Hi, Jo. It's Kelly. Sorry to call so late, but I knew you couldn't be asleep yet, and I'm dying to hear what happened in the spa."
Surprised, Joanna answered, "Not much. We hung out and talked and soaked."
"You were there a long time. Didn't you get awful hot?"
Joanna imagined the devilish look in Kelly's eyes. "When we got too hot, we swam in the pool for a while to cool down. Nothing happened."
"Darn! I had such high hopes, too. You need to go out on more dates."
"I've got one tomorrow," Joanna said, defensively.
"The manager asked you out? He's a little old for you, but he looks dangerous. That's always a good sign. So polite, too -- a great combination. And you don't need to say it. I know I have a weakness for bad boys."
"I'm not going out with Hale, unless you count going back to the spa. I think I have a standing invite for after hours hot tubbing, and I'd surely have to loathe the man to turn that one down, given how many kids live in this complex."
"Too true. Wish I could get a little after hours action, er, access, myself. Who's the date, if it isn't Hale?"
"One of my cousins set me up on a blind date. Someone Smith, I forget. It's in my PDA. He's supposed to show up tomorrow late in the afternoon."
"Hunh. Let me know how it goes. If he's creepy, tell him an emergency came up with your next door neighbor and you had to baby-sit her kids."
Joanna laughed. "If I say that, do I have to baby-sit?"
"Up to you. You know I never turn down an opportunity to go out without them, but if you want to hang out and play cards, that'd be great, too."
"I'll keep it in mind. Thanks! I should let you go to bed now."
"You know I don't go to sleep until 2 a.m., but I'll take the hint and let you get some sleep. You need to look your best for your date. Bye!" Kelly hung up.
Awake again, Joanna turned on the TV. Thinking of Hale, she found Blind Date. It was quarter past, so the first date had just ended, and the second couple about to start. As she watched the stylized date proceed, she tried to imagine what captions the producers of the show might have put underneath a camera focused on the hot tub for the past two hours. Unlike some daters on the show, neither Hale nor Joanna had flashed the camera. Would they have given her a little thought bubble when she'd walked out at the end? Would they have thought she'd decided to get out before Hale got pushy? When she had her back turned to Hale, getting out of or into the pool or hot tub, would the producers have given him ray vision, showing where his eyes were focused on her body?
What would Hale have said, when they'd asked him for fillip at the end of the date? She knew what she'd have told them. "If Hale calls me, I'll definitely go out on another date with him." She whispered it under her voice as the show ended, trying the idea on for size. When she'd dismissed Kelly's innuendo, she had thought she was sincere. With a shake, she turned the TV off and went to bed.
As Joanna fell asleep, she thought about how Kelly's teasing her to be more sociable had affected her. She wondered if she could thank Kelly without awkwardness. Her thoughts gradually drifted to Hale's sinewy body, and the grace with which he levered himself out of the pool.
A little before 1 a.m., Hale's phone rang, waking him up. He let the machine pick it up, thinking it might be a tenant. His evening had been too pleasant and relaxing to destroy by arguing with a tenant in the wee smalls. When he heard Brad's voice, he picked up the handset. "Hey, Brad. What's up? Are you still at work?"
"Yeah. Not quite last call. Since I had a lull, I called you. I thought you'd still be awake."
"I meant to be. I was going to call and ask you if you make curries."
"I do. I thought you'd sworn off them after that one time in Pakistan when--"
"Don't remind me," Hale interrupted. "It's taken years to forget that green curry. Better make it a massamun curry. But did you call me to take my food order for the next few weeks. What's up?"
"John came by the bar tonight. While we were swapping lies, we put some things together that you should know about. Someone followed me for several days about a month ago, but before I could do anything about it, the tail disappeared. John says the same thing happened to him six weeks ago. We each saw more than one person, and more than one car. We didn't think much of it until we remembered that was right before you were attacked."
"You think the people following you had something to do with the attack on me? That crew is from a job I did less than two years ago. You've both been out over three years. No connection. It doesn't make sense."
"What if your boss is wrong about who was responsible for the attack? What was the evidence?"
Hale thought for a moment. They hadn't had a lot to go on, just a body, the last remains of an arrogant, and relatively competent (although not compared to Hale) independent named Hector C. Johnson. They'd identified him as a freelancer, and then dug through databases to find out who had hired him in the past. When they realized he'd done work for a group of drug traffickers operating in that murky area on the border of Thailand, Burma and Laos, they assumed the attack on Hale was related. After all, Hale's last assignment had been near Ang Kang Park.
But Hector had expensive habits and a jones for cheap thrills. Anyone could have hired him. "There wasn't a lot to go on. Just the body."
"Just the body? Hale, the Vector was a whore. He hired out to anybody. John thinks this isn't work-related. He thinks some of our extracurricular activities have returned to haunt us, or at least you."
Hale thought back over those extracurricular activities. Back when all three were still in the service, before Brad had met Elaine and settled down, they had spent a lot of time together when not on assignment. They'd found more than their fair share of brawls, and when even those had seemed meaningless, they had occasionally done favors for friends. Most of those favors had been straightforward: find the idiot who wouldn't believe his girlfriend was now an ex-girlfriend and make it very, very clear that he should steer very, very clear of her in the future. Once they'd helped a buddy encourage a particularly obnoxious neighbor to move out. And when fathers were derelict in paying child support, and garnishing wages wasn't an option, they had been known to shake those fathers down for whatever cash or other tangible assets they could lay hands on.
In retrospect, Hale was mildly surprised nothing had come back to haunt them from all those sorry excuses for humans who had made the mistake of crossing someone that Hale, John or Brad cared about.
"Does John have a theory about who?"
"He's working on one. If he's right, whoever it is subverted someone at work, which means we're up against someone with a lot of money and resources."
"I don't buy it. We didn't go after anyone smart enough to pull that off. We had more than our fair share of bar fights, and we shook down a few guys for unpaid child support, but everyone we went after was a loser. They weren't smart enough to pull this off." Hale didn't want to believe it. If he did, his boss wouldn't be able to fix the problem for him. Or he might fix the problem, then, as the only one of the three still active duty, let Hale take the fall for all three. He had ordered Hale to think about retirement. He might add some detail to those orders.
"What if it was someone's family?"
"Everyone we nailed was written off by their family as so much waste long before we every got to them."
"I don't know. Talk to John. He'll probably call you in the morning. And sleep on it. Maybe you'll think of who it could have been. I have to go. Last call is coming up, and it's getting busier. If you're going to be home tomorrow in the late morning or early afternoon, I may stop by and drop off some food. Elaine's been nagging at me to get it out of our freezer, and the kids keep asking when they get to see you."
"That'd be great. I'd like to see them, too, before they get too big to recognize. And thanks for the warning, Brad. I appreciate it."
"No problem. I'm probably next, right?"
Hale laughed wearily, and hung up. He had long ago lost track of how many phone conversations with John or Brad had ended that way. The disturbing news had brought him completely awake, yet he still felt happier and more relaxed than he had in a long time.
The hot tub was great, but talking to Joanna was wonderful. She might worry that she wasn't clever, or that she was slow to think of things to say, or how to say them, but Hale found talking to Joanna both relaxing and energizing. He remembered his own parents, his silent father and his mother who talked a mile a minute, never shutting up, always nagging, asking questions she didn't give anyone the time to answer. When he was very young, he had wondered why his parents never went out. As he had gotten a little older, he'd realized his mother's mouth wrote checks his dad had no way to cash other than with his fists.
He had tried dating women who didn't speak much, but even they tended to talk more as they felt more comfortable around him. And he had noticed that the less he said, the more likely they were to never stop talking, as if the only cue they had to shut up was to be interrupted. Joanna was the first woman he had ever met who said what she wanted to say, or asked her question, and then shut up. She would wait endlessly, not needing to fill the empty space with words and noise and foolishness.
He had never been able to imagine living with a woman. Memories of his parents had always haunted him. When he had tried to imagine a life out of the service, alone, he thought of his friend John. As much as he liked his friend John, he didn't want to turn into him, an eccentric who grew further and further away from normal society as he spent more and more time honing his skill in the martial arts.
Joanna didn't fit into any of his ideas about what it would be like to live with a woman. She was new, and she broke the pattern. Retiring wouldn't be all bad if it meant he could be around her, and tell her about his day without worrying about secrets. As he fell asleep, he was, for the first time ever, dreaming about a life out of the service.
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Copyright 2013 by Rebecca Allen Updated July 17, 2013