“Then losing your father is especially terrible for you. I’m sorry.”
“Thanks. And... thanks for before too,” he said, looking all around the cabin, but not at her.
He caught himself. Why not look at her? He turned his head and did exactly that. She was easy to look at. She had a nice face. Not beautiful, but very nice, with smooth, creamy skin and almond-shaped eyes that tilted upward a bit. She was wearing one of those simple floral-print dresses that reminded him of another time, a more graceful era in history. Her hair was almost as dark as his own, though the overhead light showed red highlights in the deep hues of mahogany. And then there was her mouth.
Her mouth was especially nice. It looked soft and warm and giving... a lot like the woman herself, now that he thought about it. Those three words could have been stamped on her forehead. She wasn’t a heart stopper, but there was a softness and warmth about her, a nurturing quality like a young mother’s.
“Do you have children?” she asked, jarring him a bit, as if she’d taken her question from his thoughts.
“No. Why?”
“Family is a good thing to have. Children could be a comfort to you now.”
“You think so?”
“No. Not really. I don’t have anything against children, but I don’t think they’d make you feel any better about losing your father. I don’t think anything could.”
“Then why did you say that children could be a comfort to me now?”
“Because they could be. I mean, it is possible. People say they are. But I don’t have any, so I don’t know. I just don’t think it’s likely.”
“Uh-huh.” He didn’t know what else to say.
“Are you married, at least?” she asked, worried about him.
“No.”
“You’re not?” She was amazed and it showed. It made him smile a little.
“Never even come close,” he said to add to the effect. Truth be known, it amazed him. He wanted a wife and children, but it was always a someday thing, something that would happen when he got the signal—maybe if he were struck by lightning. He was nearly forty years old and still looking forward to someday. “It’s a condition my relatives are eager to remedy, but I’m... still waiting.”
She nodded her understanding. She had impatient relatives, and she was waiting too. The waiting was the hardest to bear.
His thoughts gravitated back to his father and getting to the hospital as quickly as possible. He glanced at his watch and made an impatient gesture as he recalled that time had stopped for him, minutes after he’d boarded the plane. Damn. And he’d just had the battery changed.
The plane touched down.
“I hate this part,” she said, speaking loudly to be heard over the brakes and reverse thrusters. “There’s so many more things for this plane to run into down here.”
He smiled, amused, and almost as naturally as she’d come to his aid, he came to hers, squeezing her hand as it clutched the armrest between them. The effect, however, wasn’t quite the same.
Skin touched skin, and subcutaneous nerve endings sizzled with excitement and pleasure. He tried patting her hand, but each touch sent a spasm of sensation up his arm. It was easier, more soothing, simply to submit and enjoy and wonder at the phenomenon.
She smiled at him tenuously. She wasn’t sure which made her more nervous, the intimacy of his touch or land travel at air speed.
The plane began to taxi toward the terminal, and the moment was deliberately dismissed during the business of unfastening seat belts and wrestling carry-on luggage from under the seats in front of them.
The plane stopped, and as they waited on the edge of their seats to file out, she turned to him on impulse and said, “It was nice talking to you. My name is Holly Loftin.”
“Oliver Carey,” he said, smiling, liking her as much as he’d liked any complete stranger in a very long time. “Have a good Thanksgiving with your family.”
The Carey name was familiar to her, but... well, it would have been too much of a coincidence. Surely there were many Careys not related to the Carey Foundation—tons of Careys. The Careys she was thinking of would never fly coach, no matter how desperate they were. They’d have private planes.
“Thanks,” she said, dismissing the notion entirely. Then, because she felt as if she ought to say something positive and nothing about his father’s ailment would have been, she added, “God bless you,” thinking it would pretty much cover everything she wished for him.
He hadn’t thought about God in ages, he realized. Not really. He followed her as she followed the fat woman into the aisle. Why hadn’t she said, “God bless your father”? or “Good luck with your father”? Or “I hope your father doesn’t die this time”?
In Oliver’s book, “God bless you” was a phrase worn tissue-thin in airports and on street corners, at social functions and at work, by overly enthusiastic born-again religious extremists. It had become as overused, impersonal, meaningless, and tiresome as “Have a nice day.”
But when Holly Loftin said it, it became special and sincere, and it was sticking in his mind, playing over and over. And for no reason he knew, he took heart in it.
He stayed several steps behind her into the terminal, and though he was more concerned with getting to the main entrance than to the car rental or baggage claim area, he did notice that she didn’t turn off in either of those directions either.
She was some distance ahead of him when it started. A rumbling from behind, as if a caravan of Mack trucks were barreling down the terminal toward him. The floor vibrated beneath his feet, harder and harder until it made his teeth rattle. He stepped to the wall to steady himself. It was shaking too. As many times as he’d experienced the tiny and not so tiny shifts of the San Andreas fault, it was always frightening and never predictable in its severity.
How long would it last? Should he run for an exit or stay where he was? Was he safe, or would he be buried under several tons of airport rubble? Before he could come to any decisions, the earthquake was over.
He was starting to look at the people around him when he glanced in Holly’s direction. Whatever drew his attention to the ceiling above her would remain a mystery forever, but the crack and the widening gap, the specks of falling plaster, and Holly’s bent head directly below, shot him into action.
“Holly!” he shouted, running toward her, bumping into several other dazed people when they stepped into his path. “Get out of the way. Holly! Move!”
At the sound of her name, she looked around in a haze of confusion and residual fear. By the time she saw him and realized that he was coming at her, he was upon her. He grabbed her, and she instinctively resisted his attack. They tripped over each other’s feet and fell, rolling and sprawling on the terminal floor as the ceiling came crashing in a few feet away.
Arms and legs entangled, they helped each other sit up. Through a cloud of plaster dust, Holly stared up at the enormous black cavity in the ceiling, then down at the pile of debris where she had been standing.
“That would’ve hurt,” she said, speaking aloud the first coherent thought to enter her mind.
The understatement caught Oliver’s fancy. He started to laugh, and once began, it was like a faucet for all his pent-up emotions. Grief. Sorrow. Fear. Relief. He laughed harder.
It was contagious. She grinned as she watched him, then chuckled, and before she knew it, she was giggling uncontrollably with tears in her eyes.
Tourists walked wide of them, staring, setting off new fits of chuckles. Every look at the hole in the ceiling was a fresh source of amusement. And trying to stand on fear-jellied knees was hilarious—not to mention brushing white plaster powder off each other’s noses.
“Are you sure you’re all right?” Oliver asked when he could stand
and
speak at the same time.
“Don’t I look all right?” she asked, still chuckling as she tried to brush herself clean. “I feel great.”
Airport personnel had arrived to inquire likewise and to begin cleaning up the mess.
“You’re not hurt? Bruised? That was a hard fall we took.”
“As falls go, it was the best I’ve ever taken,” she said, straightening. Her expression sobered as she looked at him. “You saved my life.”
“No.” He knew what was coming.
“Yes you did. I owe you my life.”
“No you don’t,” he said quickly.
“I do. But since you already have a life, help me think of some other way to repay you.”
“There’s no need. Really,” he said, uncomfortable with her gratitude. “I’m just glad that I saw the ceiling cracking before it fell. I’m glad you’re okay.”
He handed her the tote bag she’d been carrying and looked around for his carryall. It lay where he’d dropped it when he’d started after her.
“I know,” she said, following him back toward his bag. “It’s not much, but two of my brothers own Spoleto’s. Do you know it?”
“I’ve heard of it.”
“It’s the best Italian restaurant outside Rome, and I want you to come. Just tell them who you are, and they’ll feed you the best meal you’ve ever had—on the house.”
“That’s not necessary. I was glad to do it and...” He was suddenly inspired. “...and besides, I owed you for your kindness on the plane. Let’s say we’re even.”
“Are you kidding?” she asked, turning to chase after him in the opposite direction. “Empathizing with someone doesn’t come close to saving someone’s life. I empathize with people all the time. It’s nothing.”
“In my case, it was very much something. I needed...”
“Whoa!” she cried, reaching for him as the floor began to vibrate again. Automatically he took her in his arms, and they stood together, wide-eyed, as the earth trembled beneath them.
“Aftershock,” he muttered seconds later.
“I know.”
Through his suit jacket, she could feel his heart pounding close to hers. His arms felt like the safest place in the world.
Oliver had the oddest sensation that he’d held her close to him before. Not too tall or too short, not too fat or too thin, she was a perfect fit.
“Is someone picking you up?” he asked, holding her away from him. He felt an urgency to get her out of the airport and on her way to her family before anything else could happen.
“No. I’m taking a taxi.”
“I should have a car waiting for me,” he said. “I can take you to wherever you’re staying.”
“It’s nice of you to offer, but I’ll take a taxi.”
He frowned. He hadn’t expected a refusal. Who’d pay for a cab in L.A. when they could get a free ride? Surely she knew she’d be safe in a car with him.
“You need to be with your father,” she said, setting his thoughts straight once again.
He nodded, feeling a clear and unforeseen sense of sadness at having to leave her.
“So, it’s good-bye... again,” he said, his hands falling to his sides.
She nodded and, after a few jerky movements, extended her hand to him, saying, “Thank you. For saving my life.”
“You’re welcome. It was well worth the effort.”
The handshake was warm and strong—and enduring.
She accompanied him to the front of the airport, smiled, and said good-bye one last time, then continued down the walk to the cab stand.
But she didn’t walk alone. She could feel his presence beside her. She sensed that he was still with her. Her skin prickled, as if he were touching her.
She looked back, and though the distance was great and the pedestrian traffic obscured a complete and steady view of him, he was standing in the crowd, watching her.
A pleased sort of warmth settled in her heart. People had a way of coming and going in her life. Some left vivid images on her consciousness. Others faded to vague, dreamlike memories. A few passed through unnoticed.
When she thought about such things as life and death and the impact she made on other people’s lives, she always wanted to be a vivid image. In some small way, she wanted to leave a part of herself in everyone she touched, to achieve immortality in their memory.
She would be a vivid image to Oliver Carey, she knew. They wouldn’t meet again, but he’d never forget her. With one tiny, effortless act of charity, she had carved a place for herself in his memory that would last forever. Recollections of his father were lifelong in the making, yet every time he thought of his father, he would remember Holly’s kindness as well.
As for Holly, well, how could she possibly forget the man who had saved her life? They had forged a definite bond that day, and she was well pleased.
She raised her arm high in the air, and after a brief moment he did the same, then disappeared into the crowd.
T
HE SCENT OF FRESH-BAKED
bread laced with garlic and oregano wasn’t what most people would consider the traditional aroma of Thanksgiving, but it was for Holly.
It brought to mind a big table surrounded by the faces of people she loved. In her head she could hear them laughing and talking. In her heart she could relive the impressions of being safe and wanted.
“Nepotism never works,” Tony Spoleto said, wrapping an arm about Holly’s neck and squeezing playfully. “The help isn’t worth day old pasta. It stands around daydreaming and lets the bread get cold.”
Holly laughed and waited to be released before she slid her arm around his waist, saying, “It’s also cheap and cheerful. Besides hot bread, what more could you ask for?”
“Speed?” he asked, grinning. “Did Mama leave already?” he asked, scanning the full-to-capacity restaurant—plus three extra tables—that he and his brother owned and operated 365 days a year.
“Bobby took her home a little while ago,” she said, looking specifically at the tables in her section. “She said you had a good crowd this year and the cannelloni was overcooked.”
“It wasn’t.” He was outraged. He’d grown up speaking mostly Italian at home. And though he spoke perfect English when he wanted to, he preferred to use the more impassioned broken English of his parents for atmosphere. “What does she know, huh? She gets older and older every year.”
Holly smiled. Some things never changed. Marie Spoleto’s boys had talked irreverently about their mama since the day Holly met them—always behind her back and always with great affection.