Dear Rita

As he put his hand on the doorknob, he sought to reassure Clark one final time. “I’ll see you there tonight.” He couldn’t resist adding, “I can’t wait to meet this Cassie you’re so entranced with. And I certainly can’t wait to meet Dear Rita!”

Rita woke up with a start, sitting bolt upright in bed. The apartment was in darkness, which was a good thing, because even a sliver of light right now would be a dagger between her eyes. The nagging headache that had begun that morning had exploded into a full-on migraine sometime during the day, with all the pain, nausea and light sensitivity the devil could visit upon her. After popping more than the recommended dose of pain pills, she’d given up the battle and taken to bed around three in the afternoon, and lay there moaning, with a cold compress on her forehead and her face pressed against the wall.

Now something had woken her up, an inner alarm clock that would not be silenced. Still under the bewildering effects of sleep, she searched her mind for that thing, that very important thing she needed to do right this minute, but came up empty.

Why was she up? Was it a sudden noise, a vicious jolt of pain or the subconscious knowledge that she was supposed to be doing something? She put her hand to her head, and the touch sent waves of pain through her.

Then she remembered.

Cassie.

Oh, God.

She threw herself to the other side of the bed and her fingers frantically sought the clock. Turning it around, she could see the green glow of large digits. It was ten to seven. Cassie was coming to get her in about ten minutes, and Cassie was never late.

She toyed with the idea of calling to say she was sick, but the thought itself was a betrayal. Cassie meant everything to her. If Rita had been lying in the woods with her leg caught in a bear trap, she’d have gnawed it off in order to make it tonight.

She clicked on the bedside lamp and winced. She stripped, dashed into the shower and was out again after barely getting her skin wet. Her legs needed shaving and her hair could have done with a quick shampoo, but neither project was plausible. She toweled herself down, dragged on mismatched underwear, and threw open her closet door, cursing herself for not having decided in advance what she would be wearing. She chose a faithful old standby: a slim-fitting, warm burgundy skirt that reached mid-calf (thus solving the problem of the unshaven legs) and a sheer champagne top with a neckline that showed cleavage without plunging all the way to her belly button.

She didn’t have time to pile her twists up onto her head as she liked to do when dining out, so she satisfied herself by smoothing them so that, at the very least, they didn’t look like a fright wig. Now, for makeup—

Her phone rang. Rita snatched up the receiver. “Cass?”

“I’m outside, babe,” Cassie chirped.

Rita glanced at her dresser, strewn with pots of color, lipsticks and brushes, and hesitated. “Uh….”

“Ready, right?” Cassie asked, but her question was not a question. It was a statement that demanded an affirmative response.

Rita hesitated. Her reflection in the dresser mirror wore no makeup. Her brows needed neatening and her forehead was just a tad too shiny. She was going out on a blind date looking, if not like something the cat dragged in, at least like something the cat would have given serious consideration to.

But Cassie was a bundle of nerves and a tangle of excitement, and Rita didn’t have the heart to keep her waiting a moment longer. After all, it wasn’t as if this was a real date, with prospects for dates in the future. This was a favor for a friend, an evening to be endured, to be ended with relief. Her “date,” this Dorian Black, was probably as reluctant as she was to be dragged along as third and fourth wheels. If he wasn’t, if he thought this was anything more than it seemed, he was a bigger nerd than she expected him to be.

“Rita?” Cassie’s anxious voice was tinny in her ear. “You there?”

“Uh, yeah.” She regained control of her scrambled thoughts. “I’m here. I’m on my way down.”

“Good.” Cassie sounded relieved. “I was afraid….” She didn’t finish.

“On my way,” Rita repeated, and hung up. Pausing only to slip on a pair of pumps that were almost the same shade as her skirt, and to snatch up her purse and a light coat for the cool evening, she darted through the front door and raced downstairs. Her head pounded with every footfall.

Someone had tried very hard to create an ambience of soothing, almost trance-like calm at Vimanmek Palace. As soon as Rita and Cassie walked in, they were greeted by the tinkling of brass and the trickling of water through bamboo pipes. The interior was decorated throughout with shades of avocado, gold and a warm red, with rich wall tapestries and rows of bronze statuettes, the largest of which, a benevolent Buddha, dominated the lobby.

They were escorted into a reception area by a Thai girl clad in silk wraps of hummingbird colors: gold, emerald, turquoise and rose pink. Despite her headache, Rita was entranced by the grace with which the girl moved, and the butterfly flutters she made with her slender hands as she gestured to a corner of the room before she bowed and disappeared.

Standing there, looking nervous, was a slightly-built man in a silver-gray suit, with sandy, thinning hair, pale gray eyes and a hopeful half smile. He had been staring intently at the doorway, and when he saw them, his face brightened.

“That’s him,” Cassie hissed.

Rita’s brows shot up. “You didn’t tell me—”

“That he’s white?” Cassie interrupted defensively.

“That he’s old, ” she responded, just as quickly.

“He’s fifty-one,” Cassie retorted. “That’s not old.”

Your dad’s fifty-four, Rita would have reminded her, but they were within earshot now and Clark stepped forward, both hands outstretched. “Cassie! I’m so glad you came. You look lovely!” He blushed madly as he said it and grasped Cassie’s hands in his.

Rita looked at Cassie properly for the first time this evening. She did look lovely. Her short natural hair gleamed as though washed in sunshine. Her makeup was flawless, as was her manicure. She wore a deep green wrap dress with long sleeves and a high collar, a surprising choice for the normally unconventional Cassie. She even had a large silver brooch pinned over her left breast. Although it did little to disguise her outrageous figure, it made her look several years older. She tried not to feel too weirded out by the fact that Cassie was disguised as her own mother, and allowed herself to be introduced.

“This is my best friend, Rita Steadman.” Cassie indicated her with a sweep of her arm. “Rita, this is Clark Burrows.” She added unnecessarily, “He’s the guy I told you about.”

Clark engulfed her hands in both his warm ones. “Rita. Delighted, delighted! Cassie has told me so much about you.”

“Really?” Rita murmured the standard response. “I hope it was all good.”

“Oh, it certainly was.” He beamed. “We talked on the phone for hours yesterday, and trust me, half the conversation was about what a great friend you are, and how much you’ve been through together.”

Rita cast a glance at Cassie, who was doing nothing but standing there, smiling. She’d known that Clark had called yesterday, but she had no idea that the conversation had gone on for hours.

There was an awkward silence, where everyone seemed to be waiting for someone else to say or do something. Clark rushed in to fill it. “I think we’d better have a seat, ladies. Dorian called—that’s Rita’s date.” He smiled reassuringly at Rita. “He said he’d be a little late. He suggested we go ahead and order, and he’ll be here as soon as he can.”

She couldn’t help but feel a bit irritated. She’d made the effort to come along on this little caper, even though she was halfway through death’s doorway. So why couldn’t this Dorian guy?

Their table was large and ornate, laid with gold-rimmed china and bright silk napkins, and brushed by feathery fronds that hung down from potted plants on the wall. A water feature tinkled nearby, and small brass chimes swayed idly overhead, even though there was no discernible breeze. Rita accepted the chair that Clark held out for her, and, glad for the distraction, began to peruse the menu. She listened with mild amusement as Cassie and Clark discussed the choices, knowing full well that Cassie was doing rapid calculations in her head about fat grams, sodium content and such. She pitched in with suggestions of some of the more innocuous items on the menu for their communal dishes. Eventually, they agreed upon several simple dishes, although Clark did persuade her to order a spicy green curry to share with Dorian, promising that Dorian was a more adventurous eater.

Over hot lemongrass soup, the conversation became more relaxed. Rita found herself liking Clark. Though hardly a sparkling wit, he was charming in a Midwest farm boy sort of way. Even his nervousness was endearing.

But by the time the main courses arrived and there was no sign of Dorian, Rita’s irritation rose again. It was an awkward, left-at-the-altar kind of situation, made more uncomfortable by the fact that Cassie and Clark kept trying to draw her into their conversation, as though they felt sorry for her sitting alone like the cheese. She was thankful, but inwardly she seethed. If this Dorian person thought she’d be all sugar and spice when he did turn up—if he turned up at all—he had another think coming.

As sweetly as she could, she asked Clark, “Are you sure nothing’s happened to Dorian?”

He frowned slightly, as if the idea hadn’t occurred to him. “He’s usually not this late, but you can’t always put a time frame on legal matters. If you forgive me for using the phone at the table, I’ll give him a call.” He withdrew a small cell phone from his breast pocket and was just dialing it, again murmuring apologies, when he looked up, past Rita’s shoulder, and smiled. “There he is now.”

In spite of herself, Rita turned in her seat, toward the entrance, wondering if she would be able to guess which of the patrons entering through the doorway would be him. Would her date for the evening turn out to be another soft-spoken, homegrown Idaho farm boy old enough to be her father? But there was just one man standing there, and this was no Idaho farm boy.

The man in the doorway was so tall, he had to dip his head slightly in order to clear the low-hanging silken ropes curving down from the lintel. His skin was darker than dark, and as he drew closer she could see that so, too, were his hair and eyes. One image ran through her caffeine-addicted brain: coffee…black. The man’s skin made her thirsty.

Rita sat up straighter in her seat.

The breadth of his shoulders gave balance to his height, and the sedate navy of his suit was offset by a shirt the exact color of a cloudless winter morning sky. He walked quickly without seeming rushed, and made his way directly to their table, where Clark was already on his feet with his hand extended. The two men shook hands warmly, with Dorian uttering apologies as fast as Clark could brush them aside. Introductions were quickly made, and Rita found her hand engulfed in Dorian’s huge one. Closer now, she could examine his features in greater detail.

His brows were dense and arched, and unbelievably black eyes were framed by lashes as thick as moth’s wings. A shapely nose drew her eyes downward to a wide mouth that was saying something she could not hear, as the tinkling of the fountain nearby had become in her ears as loud as a pounding surf.

Unfashionably late or not, Dorian Black was easily one of the best looking men she had ever met.

This was not a good thing.

Chapter 4

D orian looked down into the face of the woman he had been shanghaied into having dinner with. Her eyes were even clearer and more honeyed than they had appeared in the little photograph that accompanied her column. With her hair let down (and a little messier than he would have expected for such an occasion) she looked younger, too. She appeared flustered, almost as though she hadn’t expected him to actually turn up. He was, after all, forty-five minutes late. For someone who didn’t understand how trying his prison visit day could be, and how insane things got behind those high stone walls, such lateness would seem unforgivably rude.

He repeated his apologies, this time, directly to her. “Sincerely sorry for keeping you waiting, Miss Steadman. Please forgive me.”

She looked even more flustered. “It’s, uh, Rita.”

He cocked his head to one side. “Rita, then. It’s a lovely name,” he added, more for want of something pleasant to say than out of any particular affinity for the name, which was a perfectly run-of-the-mill one, as far as he was concerned.

“Thank you.” She accepted the compliment as though she knew he hadn’t really meant it.

There was an awkward moment, the kind that usually falls between two people who have been thrown together against their wills. She motioned for him to sit. As he sank onto padded satin, he wasn’t even aware he was sighing. He was drained, not just from the pressure of having to discuss so many different cases with so many different prisoners in one day, but from the emotional toll that delving into the lives of these men took on him. He needed to remind himself that it was worth it. Sometimes his work brought disenfranchised fathers joy. Often, though, in spite of everything he could do, all they suffered was more heartache and rejection. Most nights after leaving Elcroft Green, all he wanted to do was go home, sip a solitary drink, shower and pull the covers over his head.

But the occasion demanded good cheer, so he listened attentively as Rita led him through the array of dishes, describing each one as though she had memorized the menu. Tofu rolls, fish in cucumber sauce, steamed seafood salad, roasted duck smothered in cashews, chicken in green curry, wild boar simmered in coconut milk, assorted vegetable dishes, two kinds of rice, two kinds of noodles and cups generously filled with rice wine. He wondered how poor Clark was managing. His joking advice about chugging antacid seemed inadequate. After a meal like this, Clark would need a medic.

“Are you sure there aren’t four more people coming to help us finish this?” He piled his plate with food kept warm by small heating trays under each platter.

Rita smiled, and he noticed how perfect her teeth were and how white they appeared, even though she wore no lipstick to throw them into contrast. Alluring, he mused, but as he glanced at the perfectly made-up face of her friend, he wondered how it was that she had not used so much as a little lip color or blush. He wasn’t the sort to expect that women be exquisitely painted at all times, but he was an observant man, one who made his living trying to get to the bottom of a person’s personality, discerning their motives and characteristics. Was the lack of makeup a matter of artlessness, disinterest or a political statement? His mind went back to her columns, and the men-are-dogs, women-are-goddesses spirit of them, and decided that the reason was probably behind door number three.

Again, he glanced across at Cassie, trying to get a handle on her without being too obvious about it. He’d known Clark for ten years. First, Clark had been his professor at law school. Then, when Clark grew bored with teaching and returned to private practice, Dorian had moved from summer intern, to wet-behind-the-ears employee, and finally, to full partner and trusted friend. In all that time, he didn’t remember Clark ever acting so impulsively.

She didn’t seem to be his type. The racial difference between the two was not surprising, even though he had never known Clark to date black women, because Clark was one of the most unbiased and unbigoted people he knew. It was more a matter of the age difference, which was twenty years if it was a day, and the vivacity that rolled off her in waves. Even though it was obvious that she was trying to dress older than she really was, he could sense by the way she moved and talked, the arresting color of her hair and the aura she had about her that she was much more unconventional than she was trying to look.

But the two were entranced by each other, chatting away and laughing as though they were alone. He couldn’t remember when last he’d seen Clark so animated. Even though from time to time he remembered his role as host and tried to encourage Dorian and Rita to take part in the conversation, it was obvious that he had eyes and ears only for the lovely, curvaceous young woman across from him.

Dorian wished him well.

He returned his attention to Rita, who was staring intently down at her plate, and kicked himself for having the bad manners to let his mind wander and leave her out of the loop. He tried to initiate some idle chatter. The only thing he knew about her was her work, so he decided that that was as good a place as any to begin.

“Do you just write your column, or do you do other things as well?”

She seemed relieved to have something to talk about. “Mainly the column, but I write commentaries and investigative pieces for Niobe as well, when I come up with an idea they’re willing to buy.”

“Pieces about what?”

She shrugged. “Women’s issues. Relationship articles, stories about families, and the difficulties they have staying together. Or how hard it is when things go wrong.”

“So, your background is in counseling or psychology?”

She looked at him in surprise, as though she had never considered that. “No. Actually, my college degree is in classical literature.”

He thought again about some of the cutting remarks he read from her that morning, and his brows lifted. Shelling out advice to the lovelorn without a solid backing was like dispensing medicine without a permit. What made her think she had the right to tell other people how to conduct their love lives? Unable to stop himself, he probed. “I always thought of agony aunts as being matriarchs in their sixties, who have a whole lifetime of experience—good marriages, bad marriages, kids and grandkids, fights and breakups—to rely on when they give advice. What do you base your advice on? You hardly look old enough to be a shoulder for the lovelorn to cry on.”

She bristled visibly, and he couldn’t help but notice how cute she looked doing it. The color in her cheeks made the absent blusher unnecessary. “I’m not that young!”

Maybe not, but she was hardly the Oracle of Delphi. Her indignation was endearing. Like a cat with an irritated mouse, he tweaked her some more. “Besides, it seems to me that your advice hardly ever gives the man in question a fighting chance. Women’s magazine or not, I’d have expected a column like that to be less biased.”

“Most of the women who write me know that their men are bastards. They don’t need me to tell them that. They just want someone to agree with them.”

“So you think your role is to confirm their poor opinion of men, rather than to provide them with a more balanced view?”

She twirled her noodles around her fork, but didn’t bring it to her mouth. “They want confirmation, not balance. And anyway, if their men were nicer to them, they wouldn’t need to write me.”

“Don’t you get letters from women who, despite the problems they’re having, beg you to help them find a way to keep their men?”

“Sure.”

“And what do you do?”

“Help them see the light. Try to show them that, if they’re being disrespected, they need to assert themselves. And their men need to shape up or ship out. No sense clinging to something if it’s only going to do you harm.”

“And do you ever get letters from men who are the injured parties? Men whose women have done them wrong?”

She thought about it. “I guess.”

“And what do you do?”

“I try to be fair.”

He doubted it.

She added hurriedly, “Look, I don’t hate men.”

“I didn’t say you did.”

“You’re thinking it,” she insisted.

“I’m thinking nothing of the sort,” he assured her smoothly, although that was pretty much the idea he was forming. “I was just trying to get an idea of what your work was like. It’s not often I get to meet a real writer. I’m fascinated.”

The flattery worked. She seemed mollified. “Okay, I just didn’t want you to…” She didn’t finish her thought.

He pressed again, curious to penetrate her mind even further now that her defenses were down. “And what about the men, these husbands and boyfriends who were put in their place on your say-so?”

She looked perplexed. “What about them?”

“Do you ever get letters from these rejects? Doesn’t anyone ever complain or react to your role in their downfall? Hasn’t anyone ever threatened to get even?”

She flinched as though she’d been hit, and immediately he regretted his flippant question. “I…I guess so. Sometimes they’re…angry…” She rubbed her temple as though it were sore.

Dorian immediately sensed that he’d gone too far. “I’m sorry. Did I step into something I shouldn’t have?”

“No,” she said shortly, but he knew she was lying. “Nobody’s ever reacted in a way I can’t handle. I get a few ugly letters, no big deal. You can’t be a writer if your skin’s not thick enough to handle a few bad reviews.” She swirled her rice wine around in its little cup, took a sip and switched from defense to attack. “What about you? Is your name really Dorian Black, or did you make it up because it sounds interesting?”

He’d endured enough teasing about his name not to mind a little more. “It’s all mine. My mother had an unusual sense of humor. But I promise you there’s no cursed picture hidden away in my house, getting old and gray while I stay young and beautiful—” at that, she cracked a smile “—and I certainly haven’t sold my soul to the devil for a shot at immortality.”

“That’s good to know. That devil is one tricky fellow.”

Dorian nodded. “You said it. I’m sure even I couldn’t find a loophole in one of his contracts.”

His work was as good a conversational gambit as any when two people had run out of other things to say. “So, property law must be as rife with drama as the agony aunt business, huh? Buying and selling buildings. I bet you’ve made a whole slew of enemies.”

He took no offense at her sarcasm, but set her straight on one point. “Actually, property law is Clark’s specialty, not mine. My area is family law. More specifically, divorce and child custody cases.”

She squinted a little. “You’re a divorce lawyer?”

She said the word divorce as though it tasted bad. He was used to the reaction, so it rolled off his back. “I guess you could call me that. And before you even think about it, I think I’ve heard just about every lawyer joke in the book.”

“I wasn’t planning on joking,” she informed him. “I don’t think breaking up marriages is funny.”

He shook his head. “We don’t break marriages up. We try to find ways to dissolve marriages that have already broken down, as equitably and as painlessly as possible.”

Rita snorted. “Equitably? Painlessly? If I had a buck for every woman who’s written to me to complain about her husband using a fancy, high-priced lawyer to shaft her out of what’s rightfully hers…”

His calm before the courts was legendary, but this unwarranted attack in the most innocuous of places, the dinner table, by a woman he’d known fifteen minutes, got under his skin. He answered sharply. “I can’t speak for every lawyer out there, but I can tell you that I have never shafted anyone—”

“Nah. I’ll bet you fall all over yourself to make sure that every woman who walks into your office walks away with a nice, cushy settlement…so long as you get a big cut, right?”

Her distrust for his profession was one thing, but her personal indictment rankled. “Actually, our fees are quite moderate by industry standards, and we offer the best service we can to every client. We work very hard, and we’re entitled to be paid for our labor, just like anyone else.”

“I’m sure you must charge a whole lot of very moderate fees to be able to afford a suit like that.”