Unfinished Business (13 page)

“Well, not everything,” he reminded her, showing her his fingers, still damp with her juice. Erica wasn't amused.

“Okay. There's something physical there, I'll admit
it. But that's not enough. And we both know it.”

His face got that look: considering, calculating. “Look, I'm not willing to give up what I believe in—any more than you are. But you said you'd give me a chance to learn the game. Let's let it ride a little longer. At least until we get back from Billingham. Not sure why,” he continued when she cocked a questioning eyebrow at him. “But since you're going, anyway, we might as well keep trying to figure this thing out.” He sighed with regret for what the evening might have been and then nodded toward the doors and the restaurant beyond them. “Now, come on. Let's get something to eat.”

“I
told
you—”

“And I heard you,” he said, waving the rest of the sentence away. “We'll cancel the order and do something else. Something you want to do.”

Erica eyed him skeptically. “On one condition. No politics. I don't know what we're gonna talk about…but no politics. Let's see if there's anything we agree on. Anything at all.”

That smile, the real one, the one that made him look like a handsome man and not like some all-knowing asshole covered his face. “Like that. Wish I'd said it myself,” he agreed readily. “All right. Take me where you want to go.”

“So why did you run for office in the first place?”

He glanced over at her, or what he could see of her in the low light. Her idea of dinner had turned out to be a vegetarian restaurant in the left-of-center neighborhood of Takoma Park, where she'd asked him questions about his family, about his childhood, about the funny and sad and crazy things that had happened to him when he was a fraction of the man he was now—all with that inquisitive look on her face—like he was a puzzle she couldn't quite figure out.

And the food hadn't been half bad either, he hesitated to admit. He'd had a burger of something plantlike that tasted amazingly like real food. Had he not been fully aware that he wasn't eating meat, he might have been completely deceived.

Then a very slow stroll with ice-cream cones in hand along the Mall, the grassy stretch between the Capitol Building and the Jefferson Memorial.

He'd rather the evening had ended entirely differently. The beast they'd ignited in the ladies' room was still howling within him, threatening to break its
chain and force her to his will. Years of lust, years of passion he'd kept buried inside him since Katharine's death had sprung to life. Every time she spoke, he felt her tongue in his mouth. Every time she looked at him, he imagined the feel of her breasts against his chest and her ass beneath his hand. The air between them was heavy with the mossy scent of her most private parts and Mark wanted nothing more than to bury his nose and mouth in that smell.

I lived years without sex
, he thought, walking beside her in the cool September air.
And now, in a matter of minutes, I'm busted back to being a sex-starved eighteen-year-old.
He kept telling himself to be cool, but he knew full well he'd have got down on his one good knee and begged her for it, if he'd thought it would do him any good.

But it wouldn't and he knew it, so he contented himself with limping along beside her, talking about himself and watching her listen. Just when Mark's leg was starting to smart from the exertion, she pointed to one of the many benches along the way and said, “Let's sit.”

For a while they had sat in silence, taking in the oddly romantic view. The Capitol was lit up like a national jewel, spotlights hitting its dome and running along the Italianate marble, illuminating its architecture in brilliant relief against the night sky.

So why did you run for office in the first place?
Her question hung in the air.

“That might be a political question.” He chuckled. “Remember our deal?”

“I remember it,” she said, all smart-edged and certain, awakening in him dual emotions of attraction and irritation. “But I'm not asking it that way. I'm asking it as a question of character. What kind of person runs for office? What kind of person becomes
a public servant—given all the crap you have to go through and put up with?”

“It's not crap,” he replied. “You like that word. Anything you dislike or disagree with is ‘crap.' Well, democracy is not ‘crap.' Government is not ‘crap.' It's important.”

She rolled her eyes at him. “Of course it's not,” she said. “And I'm not going there with you, remember? So why don't you just answer the question. What kind of person runs for office?”

Mark frowned. She was speaking sweetly—a little too sweetly, maybe—and she still made his whole life sound like a disease. He sighed. It wasn't going to be easy, finding any common ground with this woman outside of searing kisses and grinding body parts.

“I don't know what kind of person runs for office,” Mark answered slowly, “but I'll tell you why I did. It's simple really: Dr. Mabry made me do it.” And seeing the frown of query on her face, he continued. “Dr. Mabry taught English 101 at State College. ‘Bloody Mary Mabry' they called her. Because if she graded your paper and found it lacking, you'd get back one big red mess.” He chuckled with the memory and watched as Erica smiled along with him, her head inclined toward him with interest. Even in the near darkness, there was no way to ignore her beauty: the long curve of her neck, the sculpted outlines of her cheekbones, and the pert pucker of her lips. Looking at her stirred that tightness in his groin again, but talking to her like this stirred something, too. Something higher in his anatomy. After its long absence, his brain suddenly sprang to life again.

“So Dr. Mabry?” she prompted. “She made you run for public office? How?”

“Just something she said once,” Mark continued, picking up the skein of the story where he'd left off.
“See, she was more than just an English teacher. She was like…”—he hesitated—“Introduction to Life 101. No, Introduction to Adulthood 101. I can still remember reading some great work of classic literature—
Sister Carrie
or
Tale of Two Cities
—and hearing her incorporate the novel into a discussion of modern issues, modern problems. ‘You have a responsibility as educated members of this society to serve it,'” he said, doing his best to imitate the voice of his old mentor. “And if you don't do it, some less-qualified jerk will. Someone like Peter Malloy. And trust me, if you think I'm bad, you ain't seen nothing yet. At least I'm not stupid. And at least, I'm not so narrow-minded I can't listen to another point of you—I mean
view
,” he finished quickly. “Too many Pete Malloys get elected and we'll all have to suffer the consequences.”

Those deep brown eyes of hers were riveted to his face. She had pulled some kind of shawl from out of that sloppy handbag she carried and now her shoulders were draped in brilliant colors: orange, reds and yellows. It suited her so much better than the staid blue dress. He opened his mouth to try to find the words to tell her so, but before he got the chance, she asked, “Pete Malloy is the guy challenging you for your Senate seat?”

Mark nodded. “One of 'em. He's the other Republican I'm going to beat in the primary next week. Then there's Duncan Dukes. He's the Democrat I'm going to beat in November.”

He waited, sure she would jump all over his certainty of victory, but she just wrinkled her nose and asked, “Is Malloy that bad? Is he
really
worse than
you
?”

Mark couldn't help but chuckle.

“I
think so,” he replied. “But I guess he's not that bad. It's just he's never been anywhere. Never seen
anything. Never really been out of his one little corner of the state. Which is fine when you're a state representative and that's your job—to represent that one little corner of the state to the best of your ability. But it's something else when you're talking about the United States Senate, where you have to be able to deal with people from all over the country, all over the ideological spectrum.” He shook his head. “I can't imagine how Malloy would deal with Bob Nanke. You know who he is, right?”

“Of course. He's a Democrat.” Erica nodded. “And he's gay, isn't he?”

“Very.” Mark laughed. “I can't see Malloy being willing to so much as shake his hand. Forget about partner with him on a campaign reform initiative, like I did.”

“You did?” She frowned. “I don't remember reading about that.”

“It's going to be introduced next month. After the primaries. But we've been working together on it for months. It's going to be—” He stopped himself. “Sorry. I was talking politics, wasn't I? I can hear Dr. Mabry now: ‘Mr. Newman, could you stick to the subject, please?'”

She laughed—not that hard, nasty sound that he'd heard a little too often, but a genuine sound of amusement that brought something he'd thought was dead alive inside him.

“Did she really sound like that?”

“What?” Mark grinned beside her.

“Like that. Nasal. High-pitched. Old-lady Southern?”

Mark nodded. He held up two fingers in an oath. “Boy Scouts' honor.”

She cut her eyes at him. “I bet you
were
a Boy Scout.”

He shook his head. “Naw, not me. We didn't have money for uniforms or dues or any of that.” His head wagged again with the memory of hard times, before he raised his eyes to her face. “Who's the worst kid in your class?”

“None of them,” she answered promptly. “Some are more challenging than others,” she added quickly. “But none are ‘bad.'”

“Okay, the ‘most challenging,'” Mark repeated the politically correct phrase and tried hard to keep the sarcasm out of his voice, even though he wasn't certain he had succeeded. The moment was magical—he had the sense of really connecting to this woman at last—but
most challenging
? He wanted to roll his eyes and curse political correctness back to hell where it belonged. “I miss the days when you could call a kid ‘bad' and not get a lecture about how you're damaging their tender psyches,” he couldn't stop himself from saying, and grimaced against her expected response.

But she simply ignored him, pulling that colorful shawl a little tighter around her shoulders as though she were still cold. Mark swept off the jacket of his conservative blue suit and draped it over her shoulders.

“Thanks,” she murmured, and once again he got those laser eyes, parsing him down to atoms. “I guess it would have to be Anthony,” she said at last, returning the conversation to their last avenue. “You met him. The one fascinated with fake legs?”

Mark grinned, nodded and let her continue.

“He's a very smart boy, but…” She hesitated, and he felt her editing out less than flattering responses before she selected, “He has some behavior issues.”

“Well, I was an Anthony. And I didn't have any behavior issues. I was just plain ol'
bad
.”

Again she erupted in that musical laughter and Mark's heart soared.

“How bad?” she asked.

“Bad,” he repeated, warming to the reminiscence. “Tacks in the teacher's chair, graffiti, cutting up…You name it, I probably did it.”

“Somehow, I believe that.”

“I thought you might. Might have ended up as just another beer-drinking, carousing good ol' boy, if it hadn't been for the U.S. Marine Corps. The Marine Corps…and my Katharine.” He shook his head against the sting the memory of her always brought him. “The two of them probably saved my life.” He considered the statement for a moment, and then corrected himself. “On second thought, I know they did.”

“Tell me about her. About you…and her.”

The words were simple, straightforward almost journalistic in their inquiry, but when he looked over at her, there was something almost wistful in her eyes.

He inhaled, focusing his eyes on the twilight of the mall and searching himself for the words to explain his feelings; but all that came out was a quiet and unoriginal, “I miss her.”

She did it again. Wordlessly, soundlessly, curled those fingers over his, warm and soft and filled with such comfort he couldn't explain the sudden sense of peace that surrounded him like a blanket.

He had been about to tell her about it: how he'd enlisted after a brush with the law when he was 19 after Katharine had demanded he either make something of himself or leave her alone. About how the training had taught him about discipline, order, teamwork and pride—and Katharine had taught him to compromise, to listen, to attempt the hard job of a walk in
the other man's shoes. But instead he fell silent, staring out at the grassy walk in front of them.

A shadowy figure was walking slowly across the Mall, on a dead even course toward the bench where they sat. All he could make out was a jacket and a ball cap. It was impossible to tell gender, between the androgyny of the clothing and the dimness and distance.

He wasn't sure if it was the figure's disheveled appearance or the lingering effects of that oddball photograph she'd gotten, but Erica Johnson's fingers tightened on his. Beside him on the bench, she'd come to attention so quickly his jacket had slipped from her shoulders. The figure continued its slow march toward them.

“Mark,” she began, and he heard her fear plainly. “What…?”

“I don't know,” Mark said, already pulling himself to his feet. “But I intend to find out.”

“Let's just go,” she said, rising, too. “Let's just—”

“No one's running me off this Mall,” he told her softly. “If things get dicey, you run, you hear me? You run for help. Scream your head off, too. That always helps.” Then he stepped off toward the figure.

She caught him by the arm. “What are you going to do?”

“Find out what he—or she—wants,” he said, popping the spring on the old cane, testing the blade before concealing it again.

“Where did you get that thing?” she asked, and he heard an unmistakable edge of revulsion in her voice.

“It was made for me by a buddy from the Corps,” he replied. “Something to beat back the chicks with,” he added, knowing it would irritate her just enough to distract her from her fears. Before she could re
quest elaboration, he stumped away from her with a low-toned, “Stay here.”

The figure was within twenty feet of him, still moving slowly and deliberately. Mark realized the baggy, nondescript jacket and hat were set at angles to best conceal the figure's identity. Even the hands were crammed into the pockets, giving the person a hunched-over appearance.

Mark set his face in a hard line and notched his voice to match.

“Hey!” he shouted, making it clear with just his words that there would be a fight, if one was wanted. “What do you want?”

The figure stopped. It stood still in the dim grass, backlit by a streetlamp across the Mall, its details still all but indistinguishable. And in response to Mark's demand, it answered not a word.

“You heard me,” Mark growled, taking another halting step toward the shadowy figure. “What do you want?”