Alexandra Waring (56 page)

Cassy opened her eyes. And then she blinked. “What?”

“My scar,” Alexandra said. “I hate it. I can’t even look at myself in the mirror anymore. If I could cut my shoulder off tonight I would.”

Cassy thought about this for a moment and then turned over on her side, toward Alexandra. “I’ve got just the person for you to see. We’ll make an appointment for you as soon as we get back.”

“What kind of person?” Alexandra said a moment later.

“A doctor,” Cassy said. “A surgeon—a plastic surgeon.”

Silence.

Cassy laughed softly, scrunching her pillow into a more comfortable position. “So aren’t you going to ask me why 1 know a plastic surgeon?”

“I was being polite,” Alexandra said, sounding more like herself.

“You know Chet at WST,” Cassy said.

“Sports, sure.”

“Right,” Cassy said.

“Well, remember when that hockey player got his tendons and a nerve in his wrist slashed?”

“A couple of weeks ago,” Alexandra said.

“Right,” Cassy said, yawning and pulling the covers up over her shoulder. “Well, the surgeon who operated on him has a specialty in microsurgery—you know, hands—but she’s also a plastic surgeon. And so Chet—get this—asks me to go see this doctor, pretending I want a
face
lift. And then once inside, you see, I was supposed to try and get the inside scoop on the player’s recovery.”

Alexandra was now laughing.

Cassy sat up. “So I said, ‘Thanks a lot, Chet! A whole face lift? Forget it! I won’t go unless it’s just to get my eyes done.’”

“You mean you went?” Alexandra said, turning over.

“Uh-huh,” Cassy said. “Oh—but she was wonderful, Alexandra. You’d love her. She’s—”

“And did you get it?” Alexandra said.

“What, a face lift?” Cassy said.

“The scoop on the player.”

Cassy leaned over and whispered, “I forgot completely about it—can you believe it?” She sat back, laughing. “Never even crossed my mind after I got in there.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Oh, I’m not,” Cassy said, “ask Chet. I don’t know—I just had so many questions about so many things I’ve always wondered about. Because I
have
thought about it, you know—getting my eyes done. And then I started asking her about face lifts and—” She laughed a little, embarrassed. “Oh, Alexandra, you’d have to meet her to understand—she’s just the most extraordinary doctor. She seems to know more about how people feel about themselves than—I don’t know, I think I’d rather see her every week instead of my therapist.”

“So what about your eyes?” Alexandra said, sounding a bit dubious.

“Oh,” Cassy said, sighing, “we agreed I’d come back and see her in a couple of years.”

“You mean she didn’t think you should do it?”

Cassy gave Alexandra’s shoulder a little shove. “Why, you think I should?”

“No,” Alexandra said, yawning, “it’s just that I’ve never heard of a plastic surgeon who didn’t think someone needed surgery.”

“That’s why I want you to go see her,” Cassy said, yawning too, sliding back down under the covers. “She’s wonderful. And I told her about your scar and she said she does that kind of work all the time.”

“I’ll go see her,” Alexandra promised, yawning again, rolling over on her other side, away from Cassy. She sighed, quietly. “Good night.”

“Good night,” Cassy said.

Silence.

Cassy sat up. And then she reached over to touch Alexandra’s back. “Sweetheart,” she said, “you’re shivering. Are you cold?”

“At this point,” Alexandra said, “I’m so tired I wouldn’t even know.”

“Well, here, wait—” Cassy said. She moved over and slid down in behind Alexandra, putting one arm under her pillow and the other around Alexandra’s waist. “Better?” she said gently.

“Reassuring,” Alexandra said, closing her eyes, “thank you.”

“You’re safe, absolutely safe,” Cassy whispered.

“I know,” Alexandra murmured, taking Cassy’s hand in her own then and holding it to her chest.

In a minute, breath fading, her body still, Alexandra was asleep.

In a while Cassy fell asleep too wondering when or how she would tell Alexandra about Jackson.

When Cassy awakened in the morning it was to find Alexandra sitting over her, smiling.

“Good morning,” Alexandra said.

For a moment Cassy forgot where she was, what year she was in. And then she thought of Michael and then she remembered that Michael was no longer an issue; and then she remembered Jackson and remembered that, no, their affair was not a dream, she awakened with him almost every morning now; and then she thought,
Alexandra?
, but remembered that she had stayed the night with her because someone had tried to shoot her again and she had been frightened.

“Good morning,” Cassy said, sitting up on her elbows, looking for the travel alarm that was no longer there. “What time is it?”

“Ten to nine,” Alexandra said.

Cassy looked around the room; everything was packed up. She looked back at Alexandra. She was dressed in a skirt, blouse and heels, earrings and bracelets, ready to go.

“I’m not going back to New York with you,” Alexandra said.

Cassy looked at her.

“I don’t want to argue, I don’t want to talk about it either,” Alexandra said, getting up and walking to the window. “Just take my word for it”—she was opening the drapes now, letting the light in—”I need to stay out on the road and get my head straight.”

Cassy sat up. “Get your head straight about what?”

After a moment, looking out the window, hands in her skirt pockets, Alexandra said, “I want to marry Gordon.” And then she paused, squinting at the horizon. “I want to be married. I want to belong somewhere. Like other people do. A home, I guess—I guess that’s what I mean.” She shook her head, slowly, and then sighed. “I’m so tired of feeling like a special case all the time.”

“That’s not something that marriage fixes,” Cassy said.

“No, I suppose not,” Alexandra said, still looking out the window.

Silence.

“Strange things happen when you almost die,” Alexandra said then. “And it scares me that all I have to do is think that maybe I won’t be alive tomorrow and then everything that was so important suddenly isn’t so important.” She paused, swallowing. “Like getting married to Gordon.” She paused again. “I get scared because I think I might know what I really want.”

“And what’s that?” Cassy said.

For a moment Alexandra did not react. And then she laughed to herself, letting her head fall back so that she was looking up at the ceiling. “Oh, God,” she said. And then, laughing again, she lowered her head and turned around to look at Cassy. “That’s what I love about you.”

“What?”

“That you are the brightest, most capable person I’ve ever met—and yet,” Alexandra said, “you can be so incredibly dumb sometimes.” She took a step forward. “I used to think it was an act—but I’ve come to recognize that if Cassy Cochran doesn’t want to see anything wrong with someone she cares about, then, by God, she doesn’t see anything wrong.”

“That’s not the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me,” Cassy said.

“No, it’s not,” Alexandra said, coming over to the bed, “but people who get shot at get to have one self-indulgent morning—don’t they?” She sat down on the edge of the bed. “Listen, Cassy, I need some distance from New York. I need some time away from everybody—to think things through, sort stuff out in my head. Now—while Gordon’s away. I need to work, move around, get some perspective. And I won’t be able to do that if I go back with you.”

Cassy sighed, brushing a piece of hair back off Alexandra’s forehead. “I still think you should come home for a few days. We can start up the tour again—next week, maybe.”

Alexandra was shaking her head.

“Look, Alexandra, you can’t—”

“What I need is to get right back in the saddle,” Alexandra said, getting up and going into the dressing room. In a moment she came back out again, slinging a large bag over her shoulder. “I left some clean underwear for you in the bathroom.”

“Jackson’s going to go berserk,” Cassy said.

“But not for an hour,” Alexandra said, walking over to the bed. “And what’s one more fight between you two? And I have every confidence you’ll handle the situation beautifully.” She leaned over and kissed Cassy on the cheek. Looking at her, “Thanks for staying with me last night.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I love you,” Alexandra said.

“I love you too,” Cassy said. “But wait, Alexandra—”

“I’m fine,” Alexandra said, halfway to the door, “really.” She opened it and then turned around. “You’re taking Dash and Jackson home and I’m taking everybody else to Indianapolis, bodyguards too. Okay?” She looked at her watch. “I gotta run—they’ll be waiting for me downstairs.”

“I still don’t think—” Cassy started to say.

“You should let me go, Cassy,” Alexandra told her. In a moment she added, “Really. I wouldn’t say it if it wasn’t true. You should let me go.”

They looked at each other for a long moment. And then Cassy sighed. And then she nodded. “Okay,” she said. “But please be careful.”

“To the Crossroads of America,” Alexandra said, closing the door behind her.

40
Jackson Can’t Believe It

Jackson was furious. The only thing that kept him from going after Alexandra and physically dragging her back to New York was the fact that the bodyguards he had hired for her had been taken along and that Cassy kept insisting, over and over again, that Alexandra knew what she was doing and that they should leave her alone.

“If what she’s doing is so right,” Jackson said for the fifth time, “then why did they sneak out of the hotel? She told me we were meeting at ten.”

“Because she knew you’d try to stop her,” Cassy said for the fifth time.

They were Flying home in the Gulfstream. Dash was sitting across from them, facing them in one of the six seats in the main cabin area. He was trying to read a copy of
Sports Illustrated
, the pages of which were turning faster and faster as Jackson and Cassy started in again.

“She should come home where we can protect her,” Jackson said, slamming his armrest.

“Give it up, will you?” Cassy said.

“I won’t, damn it!” he said. “Not until you tell me why you let her go.”

“I will say this one more time, Jackson. One,” she said, striking her index finger against the palm of her other hand, “she refused to come home. Two, I can’t make her come home, thanks to her contract. Three, she’s a newswoman—not a politician, not a movie star. If she can’t go out and cover the news, then she’s no longer a newswoman. Four, she’s been through this before and knows she has to get back in the saddle again.”

“She
doesn’t
know,” Jackson said, “she’s a kid.”

“Five, she knows that if she goes on with the tour the ratings for DBS News will—”

“Oh, great!” Jackson said, hurling his newspaper across the cabin. “So we just sit around and wait to see which new kook’s gonna blow her head off next to raise her ratings?”

Cassy stared at him. “How dare you say such a thing to me,” she finally said, fumbling with her seat belt, getting it undone and standing up.

“I still don’t understand why you let her go,” Jackson said.

“I don’t know!” Cassy said, throwing her hand out. “All right? I don’t know why I let Alexandra go. I’m just
dumb
, I guess. So if you want her to come back to New York, you do something—
you
go and get her.” She whirled around and walked away.

“Where are you going?” he demanded.

“Anywhere,” she said. “Out the window maybe.” She walked to the head of the cabin, all of fourteen feet away, and threw herself down in one of the seats facing forward.

Jackson sighed, rubbing his eyes. Then he dropped his hand and looked across the way at Dash. His eyes were glued to the magazine.

Jackson undid his seat belt, got up and went around to the curtain into the tail section where the steward was. “You got that Dodgers tape somewhere?” he asked. The steward came up with a video cassette and Jackson took it back out into the cabin and over to the bar where the TV screen was. “Wanna see yesterday’s Dodgers game?” he said.

“Sure,” Dash said.

Jackson opened a drawer, took out some earphones and tossed them to him. “Just stick in that plug there on the side.” He turned on the unit, slid in the cassette, pushed a button and the Dodgers came onto the screen. He looked in another drawer, took out a remote control and tossed this to Dash too. “Okay?”

Dash nodded, giving him the OK sign.

Jackson walked up and stood next to Cassy’s seat. When she looked up his heart gave way, and his anger did too. She was crying. And it was very hard to be angry with the woman he was falling hopelessly in love with when she was crying. Particularly when he was making her cry.

“I have to leave,” she said, pressing the bridge of her nose with her hand. “I can’t do this job properly anymore. Dexter wants me to come back to buy some stations for them and I think I should go.”

Jackson sank down, kneeling by her seat, resting his arms on the armrest. He looked back down the cabin at Dash. He was busy with the Dodgers. He looked back at Cassy, reaching to take her hand.

“Don’t,” she said, pulling it away.

Dash is watching a video,” he said.

“Just don’t, please,” she said, turning to the window.

Jackson sighed, taking out his handkerchief and pressing it into her hand. “I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s just that I’m worried about Alexandra.”

“And I’m not?” she said. She wiped her eyes with his handkerchief, dropping her hand in her lap.

“Look, darling—”

She covered her face with her hands for a moment. And then she dropped them, sitting up in her chair, looking at him. “I can’t work like this, Jack. I can’t work with you—having you call me darling.”

“I won’t, I’m sorry,” he said.

“And it’s not just you. It’s Alexandra too.” She sighed, looking straight ahead. “We’re too close. I know too much about her—I keep trying to make decisions for her that I have no business making.” She looked at him. “And our relationship. Do you know how it feels for me to hide it from Alexandra? And how Langley—Jessica—” She cut herself off, wiping her eyes again. “How am I supposed to be worthy of their trust, to do my job while I’m carrying on like this with you?”

“But you’re not carrying on,” Jackson said.

“Damn right I’m not,” she said, blowing her nose. “That’s just the problem,” she added. “And I hate it.” She made a fist around the handkerchief and then hit her thigh with it. “I can’t stand not operating aboveboard. I can’t stand secrets—all this, this
…
”

“I know, I know,” Jackson said, reaching into her lap for her hand and getting it this time.

Cassy sighed, closing her eyes, tightening her grip on his hand. “Oh, Jack,” she said, opening her eyes and turning to look at him. “What have I done?”

“You haven’t done anything,” he told her. “You’re just having a—an affair, that’s all.”

She looked at him. “No, that’s not all,” she said.

He swallowed. “No?”

She hesitated. And then she whispered, “I’ve fallen in love with you—and it terrifies me, Jack. Because I don’t know how I can go back if I have to. Back to before.”

Jackson blinked several times. “Did you just say that you love me?”

She nodded.

He searched her eyes. After a moment, he said, “Could you say it again? Would you? Please?”

“I love you,” Cassy said. “I love you very, very much, Jackson.”

“Oh,” he said. And then he closed his eyes and let his head fall forward, not caring if Dash saw his head in her lap or not.

He couldn’t believe it. He couldn’t believe that she had said it.

She loved him. Cassy said she loved him.