Chapter 2
For a while Mason was strolling along the beach, fighting the temptation to drown his sorrows in a bottle. Soon he had to admit the fight was lost; so he entered ‘Johnny’s Place’ and sat at the bar stand.
A red-haired waitress blinked at him shortsightedly. Jane, he recalled. “Jane,” he said with a sweet smile he always offered bar-tenders and waitresses, “can I have a drink please?”
The omnipresent, eternal Pearl showed up. “Jane, let ME serve the gentleman… Mason, would you take a table if you please?”
Mason made a face, but seeing that Pearl took a tray and started collecting various bottles, he conceded.
In a minute Pearl and the tray both joined him.
“Why the honour?” Mason grumbled. “I could do very well by the bar stand.”
“Just wanted to have a word or two with you – if you don’t mind, that is.” Pearl was smiling his usual broad smile.
“I’m in no mood to talk right now, sorry, pal.”
“Why don’t you go home, then, and make peace with Julia?” said Pearl in his carefree manner.
Mason glared at him. “Much as I respect Julia’s right to have friends and to discuss her private life with them – this happens to be my private life, too, and I strongly object to people meddling with it.”
“That’s what I like about you, Mase,” Pearl replied with a kind of admiration, “you always make yourself so clear.”
“Thank you; shall we drink to this?”
“One more minute, please. I just need to pick your brains, and I mean your sober brains.”
“You can take them; I won’t need them tonight. Just drop them by my place first thing tomorrow morning, will you?”
Mason took hold of the nearest bottle. Pearl grabbed at it, too.
“Mason, please. I know you’re depressed and therefore think you have every right to forget the world--”
“And why the hell not?” Mason said, annoyed. “I see, Pearl, that you’ve probably outgrown the professional limits of a bar-tender…”
“Actually I’m a detective now; a co-founder of a detective agency. With Cruz Castillo.”
“My congratulations and very best wishes. So?”
Pearl and Mason were still pulling the bottle, each in his own direction. Pearl felt he had to yield if he wanted to be heard out. “Look, I’m letting this thing go,” he warned, lest it be broken, and he did.
Mason replaced the bottle onto the tray. “Absurd,” he murmured.
Strange as it might seem, absurd was better than down; and Pearl was, after all, but a stranger. One can talk to a stranger more freely.
“Sorry Mase,” Pearl added. “I know--”
“It’s ok. It can wait a few minutes. What’s your business?”
Pearl pouted his lips, turning his braid over and over in his fingers.
“If its sole purpose is NOT to prevent me from drinking,” Mason specified and secured one of the bottles in his hand.
“No, not really… Have you ever heard of an – Eleanor Norris? A beautiful woman. They say she looks very much like Pamela Conrad in her youth.”
His mother’s name mentioned made Mason forget the spirit. “I’m not sure I have. Go on.”
“This Eleanor appeared to be really Elena Nicholas, Dr Alex Nicholas’ daughter.”
“So she did; what of it?”
“I just found out she’s his adopted daughter.”
“Ok, why should it interest you – or me?” Mason could not see the point.
“She’s working for the agency now,” Pearl explained. “’The Last Resort’ we called it; a nice name, don’t you think?”
“Very nice.” Mason leant back.
“She looks at Cruz as if he were a vanilla ice-cream.”
Mason laughed. “I can imagine. Cruz does have such an effect on impressionable girls. What, are you jealous?”
Pearl knew Mason hit the nail on the head; but from a certain moment on he had not been as much interested in Elena’s female charms.
“No but your sister is,” he said calmly. “And oh, by the way, do you know there have been several attempts to do away with Kelly and Eden?”
“By the way?” Mason echoed. A part of him howled, what? will this ever end?! The man, the protector in him, however, shut the impulse up; whatever Pearl was, he was not a gossip monger, nor a windbag, and even if he was not saying anything definite now, one still was to take him seriously. “Jane. Would you please take away this tray, thank you. So – what do you mean, by the way?”
Pearl was glad the spirit did not distract Mason any longer. “I mean - there was an Indian seen with Elena… We can’t be sure it is THE Indian, for none of us has seen him.”
Mason’s lips set. “And--”
“And – Elena sees your mother quite often, and always in secret.”
“You mean to say my mother--”
“No, no, no need to fly into a passion. Not your mother – but wouldn’t you at least get alarmed?”
Mason would not say it aloud, but for a while his instincts had been telling him Pamela was hiding something from him. Something definitely unpleasant. So he controlled himself. "And since you''re a detective, why don''t you get busy with it?" he asked Pearl.
It was Pearl''s turn to make a face. "You know if we detectives started spying on our own employees what time would we have for our clients?"
Mason had to agree. “What do you want me to do?” he said, businesslike.
Pearl shrugged his shoulders. “Ask your mother a few questions, but don’t be too obvious. Use your detectives to dig anything they can on Elena. Well, I guess you’ll figure out what to do – just to make sure the lady with two names doesn’t have two faces as well.”
“Thank you Pearl,” Mason said slowly.
Pearl stood up, and then he bent down. “Hey Mase,” he said kindly. “You’re happier than I am; you have a home and someone to come home to.”
A curt reply was ready on the tip of Mason’s tongue, but when he met Pearl’s eye he reconsidered it. “Thanks Pearl,” he said again, whole-heartedly.
Chapter 3
Mason came back home in an hour or so. He had spent some time on the beach again, thinking over Pearl’s fragmentary information and what he was to do concerning it. After that, he thought he was ready to face Julia again, without betraying his anxiety.
Standing by his door and fumbling in his pocket for the key, Mason heard music. MUSIC? Was she listening to music? He detested music now. Thank God, at least it was a classical piece.
He unlocked the door. Julia was watching the flames in the fireplace; she did not turn to look at him.
“No I haven’t been drinking,” Mason informed her.
This time, Julia did turn round. “Why?”
“Don’t you think I notice you’re just waiting for this to happen?” He sat down. “I may have a drinking problem, Julia, but y o u r problem is much more serious.”
Julia sprang up. “And I thought you probably were going to apologize!”
“To apologize? What for?”
“For treating me like – a hired servant, if not worse.”
“I’m sorry if it looked this way,” Mason said indifferently. “Oh, would you please switch off the music. You know I can’t stand the sound of it, now.”
“I know, but I will not, sorry. I need music for my baby. The doctors say it can hear now, and I want it to hear classical music.”
Mason looked taken aback. “Oh – okay.”
They kept silent for a while, listening to Tchaikovsky’s chords. “Can it hear voices?” Mason asked.
Julia nodded.
“Then it’s good I haven’t said anything too hurtful to its mother.” He paused. “Have I?”
Julia gave it some thought. Mason waited patiently.
“It’s not been easy to deal with you these days, Mason,” she said finally, trying to keep the blame out of her voice.
He nodded. “I know. I’m sorry.”
“I – I think there’s some truth in what you said tonight, though. I’ve been thinking you might start drinking again.”
“It’s harder not to, when it’s kind of generally expected from you,” Mason pointed out, not unkindly.
“I’m sorry. I’ve tried to – to support you.”
“I know, Julia.” Mason sat down onto the floor and brought her to him. She leant on him heavily.
“I missed this.”
“Me too. It’s just – so hard.”
The room was lit only by the fire, and the music stopped. Matt was asleep.
“I tried to be there for you,” Julia said softly.
“Yes. And I am very grateful.” Mason frowned. “Julia, it’s not that simple for me, either. I’m not being naughty, and not trying to be difficult.”
“I see. Shall we – postpone the wedding, maybe?” she supposed.
“Oh no,” he smiled into her hair. “Not now that you’ve seen the darker sides of my nature; I’m not letting you out now.”
“Want to be stuck for life with an ill-tempered vixen?”
“Not less than you want to be stuck for life with an egotistical alcoholic.”
Julia stirred. “Mason – I’m sorry I let you down.”
“Hush. You did not.” He patted her hair.
“I never told you – my father is an alcoholic.”
For a few minutes Mason kept quiet. He did not really think himself an alcohol addict, but this explained Julia’s behaviour.
“I’m sorry,” he said at last. “I didn’t know.”
Was she attracted to him only because of his drinking problem? Mason did not like the idea.
“Maybe I’ve really been too – jumpy – with you.”
“My poor Julia,” he murmured.
“You know I do not want it to happen, it’s kind of subconscious.”
“I understand now. It certainly sometimes looked like you wanted me to get drunk.”
“No!” protested Julia.
“Want to talk of your family?”
She shook her head. “Actually I’m trying to think of you, Matt and my baby as my family now.”
Mason felt his heart bathe in a warm glow. He took a pause, to secure the feeling. Julia misunderstood. “I’m sorry,” she stumbled. “I know Matt is not my—”
“Shh. He is not – but you’ve been there for him ever since he was born, and he loves you.” Julia looked up, and Mason kissed her brow. “Just try not to play the role of your mother,” he said thoughtfully. “And as to my own demons, with the help of my family I think I can cope.”
He leant closer to Julia’s ear and whispered right into it, “And I’m putting forward a proposal: we should sleep together from now on.”
He knew the hot whisper into her ear turned Julia on; and he was satisfied when under his palm he felt goose bumps appear on her naked skin. He wanted her, too.
“Mason—”
“Yes, my sweet lass? The bed’s big enough for two, and you won’t have to run to me barefoot the moment you hear me groaning.”
“Mason--” she tried again.
“What I’m trying to say is, I need you,” he said softly.
And Julia conceded – he was very careful not to leave her any choice.
TBC
Olga Lissenkova
