From Cape Town with Love (6 page)

That was either true love—or nice work if you could get it.

Up close, I realized Sofia Maitlin
might
have pixie dust between her legs. It was possible. Her smooth skin crackled, even from a distance.

And now, here we were.

She stood up abruptly. “Come with me, Mr. Hardwick,” she said.

She walked toward a different glass door—leading to her master bedroom. I fell behind her, stopping just inside the doorway to leave
plenty of space between us. Lynda Jewell had told lies about me that cost me my job on my television series, so I was still in High Caution mode with women I didn't know. For all I knew, Sofia Maitlin might still be looking for revenge sex after her billionaire humiliated her on TMZ.

In Maitlin's bedroom, there were framed photographs on the bureau, alongside stacks of books and magazines. Her iPod dock was playing Afro pop by Brenda Fassie, a late legend Alice and I once saw in concert.

“You know South African music?” I said.

She nodded. “We shot
Vintner
here a couple of years back, and I was out dancing every night. The Cubana in me, I guess. I breathe music, and the music here is exquisite.”

“Maybe the best in the world,” I said. Alice and I had once agreed on that. The harmonies of Ladysmith Black Mambazo and the Soweto Gospel Choir are awe-inspiring.

“Come in,” Sofia Maitlin said. “I want to show you something.”

I hesitated, but I walked beside her since she was near a small table and chairs instead of the bed. I smelled lavender, maybe from her hair. Maitlin pulled up a bottle of wine chilling in mostly melted ice cubes in a silver bucket on the table. The bottle was from Stellenbosch, vintage 2006. She pulled out the well-used cork.

“What do you think of Viognier-Roussanne blends?” Maitlin said.

I looked at my watch: seven thirty in the morning. “I think it's best to wait for breakfast to break out the wine.”

She gave me a sarcastic smile. “Touché. Rachel and I didn't quite finish this one off last night, and if you love Cape Town, then I assume you must love wine.”

“Let's say I do.” I still had Alice's impressive wine collection at home.

“It was great to win the Oscar, but the biggest perk for six weeks at a vineyard? A lifetime supply of the most delectable wine,” she said. “You'll have to try this.”

“I'd love a taste,” I said. But my eyes were on her, not the wine.

Mailin smiled when she poured me half a glass. It was way too early for wine, even good wine, but I sampled the blend to be gracious. The white wine was so golden, it might have been glowing. The pear scent hit my nose as soon as I raised the glass. With a sip, I tasted apple, apricot,
a touch of citrus. Floral notes. It had a strong, sweet flavor, with a hint of minerality. Memorable. I made a mental note to buy a bottle.

“Very nice. Perfect for a spicy curry. The mineral taste . . . ?” I couldn't help trying to impress her.

Maitlin's smile widened. “Cement barrels. It's special, isn't it?”

I set my glass back down after a lone sip. “But I don't drink on the job.”

Maitlin nodded, pleased. I'd figured she was testing more than my knowledge of wine. Any bodyguard who would get buzzed at the interview wasn't a good hire.

“My guru has been saying for years that it's time for me to be a mother,” Maitlin said, her voice quiet. “She says a strong family is the only way to safeguard against the negative vibrations in Hollywood, and I agree. That's why I'm going to Langa.”

Maitlin wasn't the first person to expect a child to cure her life's ills. But hell, maybe Maitlin's guru was right. I wanted to tell Maitlin how I'd met a teenage prostitute while I was investigating a case, how I'd taken her into my house to keep her away from the streets. And how Chela was almost eighteen, and I was going to pay to send her to college. I wanted to tell her all about me.

“Sounds like a good reason,” I said.

Maitlin picked up a photo frame from her bureau, which she stared at for nearly thirty seconds before she gave it to me. The frame held a stylish black-and-white photo of a white-haired man and a woman with Maitlin's nose, both in their sixties. I saw the pieces of them in Sofia Maitlin, jumbled and rearranged. The photograph had caught them laughing at something off to the side.

“Mom and Papi,” she said. “They weren't perfect—an artist and an activist trying to raise a kid?—but they gave me everything they had. Mom was always bugging me about having kids. I saw so many beautiful children the last time I was here, and I haven't been able to get them out of my head. But the time wasn't right. I'm ready now. Today, I want to see those children again. I want to bring a child home and give her everything I was blessed to have. More.”

It was only my imagination, but in the photo I thought her mother's eyes laughed.

“Children First?” I said, remembering. “Are they reputable?”

“They've only done two transnational adoptions, but my lawyers said they check out. It's a very small agency run by a private mission.”

“Will you take the baby home today?” It didn't seem likely; there were no toys or baby gear in sight. But the baby would change our scenario, so I had to ask.

Maitlin sighed, gently removing the photo from my hands to return it to its place. “I wish! But it's not possible. There are piles of bureaucracy ahead. It can take five years to get approved here, they told me. But a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”

I hoped it would work out for her. I didn't want Sofia Maitlin to leave South Africa with my kind of disappointment.

Maitlin looked up at my face, studying me.

“Want to see the real reason I always book this room in Cape Town?” she said, and moved away, expecting me to follow. I did. She took me to the spacious bathroom's doorway.

There, in a corner by a large white soaking tub, were two huge picture windows that made the room feel like it was built entirely of glass. I could imagine her bathing with nothing but the sky above her and the ocean below. The view was breathtaking from the living room and balcony, too, but the bathtub made it a private peek show. Spectacular.

There were no words for it. We stood in silence a moment, humbled by the vision of morning in Cape Town.

“This doesn't happen often, does it?” she said thoughtfully.

“What doesn't happen?”

“An instant spark.”

She was standing two feet from me, but suddenly the distance seemed much smaller.

“Excuse me?” I said.

“The spark between two strangers. It's a rare, delightful thing.” Her voice was soft.

I had two warring instincts: The first, and strongest, was to lock the door and pull her into that tub with me. My next instinct was to take two steps back, toward the doorway. Training overcame them both: I did neither. I didn't move. This was a game, and I wanted it to play out.

“And because it's so rare,” she went on, “we're supposed to think it
means something. We're two attractive people, two polite people, and we want to think that's a license to act out the dirty pictures in our heads. I'm sure you could make a woman lose her mind for a while.”

Since I hadn't lost my mind, I had heard enough to understand where this was going. I became ice, and ice could not smell the lavender in her hair. Or wonder how her skin tasted.

“Ms. Maitlin, I don't know what you think you've heard about me . . .”

“I didn't have to hear anything.” She laughed. “Sex drips off you, Mr. Hardwick. And if I can see it, the others can, too. Rachel will see it, and you don't want that. She'll bounce you off the job before you get started. My manager is Moses to me.”

My face wanted to go hot. I lowered and slowed my breathing, putting an end to that.

“You're a beautiful man,” she went on. “I hear you're an actor.”

“Malibu High,
some commercials,” I said. “Nothing like you.” To amuse her, I adjusted my facial muscles into “actor” mode. “‘The future looks bright!' ” I said; the catchphrase had paid my bills for months.

“I remember,” she said in a voice that made me doubt it. Her lips drew into a thin line. “You'll want to listen to me very carefully, Mr. Hardwick.”

“I'm listening.”

“The spark between us is there. I know and you know. But I'm engaged to a wonderful person. Greek, very proud. He gives me freedom, but he's old-fashioned. He's very patient with me. And he is in love with me.”

She didn't mention that she was in love with him, too. Her fiancé, Alec Dimitrakos, could be excused for an old-fashioned streak—he was twenty years older than Sofia Maitlin. But his two billion dollars went a long way toward erasing wrinkles.

“So I've heard,” I said. “Congratulations.”

“I would never do anything that could hurt or shame him,” she said. “And I couldn't work with someone who might give that appearance. I'm in the process of building a family, which I intend to carry out with the same tenacity that built my film career.
Punto.”
Period.

“I understand.” I had entered my professional space. Maitlin was testing me again. She wanted to make sure I was thinking about her safety, not her ass. Actually, I approved.

“So you'll call me Ms. Maitlin, never Sophia. You are not to be photographed walking beside me. I don't need you to open doors for me or carry my umbrella in the heat. And if you can stop oozing sex, we might work together again.”

I smiled. “I'm not concerned about working with you again.”

She raised an eyebrow, surprised. “No?”

I had a test of my own. “All I care about is you coming back from Langa safe and whole,” I said. “That means I'll judge my distance from you depending upon the situation. You'll agree to follow my directions, and trust that I won't ask for anything I don't need for your protection. You have your professional and personal standards, and I have mine. I can't take responsibility for your safety unless you let me do my job.”

Either I had just lost the job, or I had just sealed it. I didn't know which until Sofia Maitlin smiled. “Agreed,” she said.

I wasn't finished with her.

“And I can't take the job if you go to Langa this morning as scheduled, Ms. Maitlin,” I went on. “The driver in the van? I can't allow an unknown second party to drive us. And I've never laid eyes on this orphanage, so I can't—”

“Roman, my head of security, has left a folder for you,” Maitlin said, ready for my objections. “All that paranoid stuff is on the dining-room table. Information on the driver. Photos. Maps. Schematics. I'll give you time to digest it.”

“I may need more time than you want to give me,” I said.

“How will we know unless you get started?” she said, winking. “I'd like to get dressed.”

We made our deal without a handshake. Touching her would have been a bad idea.

“Sí, como no,”
I said as I turned to go, an homage to her Cuban roots.
Yes, right.

“In the next life,
guapo,”
she said, almost to herself.

With that, my head slightly spinning, I left Maitlin alone with her ocean and the morning sky. We were both actors, but unless she had figured out how hard I was from the moment I set foot in her bedroom, I deserved the Oscar more than Sofia Maitlin ever had.

Maitlin hires Tennyson

http://www.simonandschuster.com/multimedia?video=87313459001

ROMAN'S RESEARCH WAS
meticulous. He had collected the names and photos of every orphanage worker who would be present, attaching their clean police records. He had photos of the two-story Children First facility from several angles, including the front and rear doors, with a detailed risk analysis. The facility reminded me of a well-kept inner-city school, and it had an impressive playground. Brand new. Crime was fairly low in that section of Langa, and local police had promised an escort. I called Langa police to verify that six officers would be waiting.

By ten
A.M.
, I was ready to go.

When I climbed into the front seat with the black African driver and shook his hand, I leaned close enough to try to smell his breath. His driving and criminal records were clean, according to Roman's file, but everyone has secrets. No alcohol, from what I could tell. Good start. Princess Diana might be alive today if her driver hadn't been drunk.

“My name is Toto, like the little dog,” he said when he introduced himself. Two missing teeth transformed his smile into a leer. There was an old doll on the passenger-side floor, a nude white Barbie with blond hair cascading down her back. The doll's grubby face told me that she had brought nameless little girls more joy than her current condition could convey.

“Is Langa home to you?” I asked the driver as he pulled away from the hotel, although I already knew from Roman's file.

“From birth.” He glanced in the rearview mirror at his passengers with curiosity.

“Do you work for Children First?” Again, I already knew.

“When Mama Bessie calls, we all work for her,” he said. “She knows I don't lose my head over silly things.” Another glance in his rearview mirror. I couldn't blame him; I wanted to stare at Sofia Maitlin, too. But I also wanted him to keep his eyes on the road.

“How are things in Langa?” I said.

“You can see for yourself,” he said, shrugging. “It's Saturday. Burial day.”

While Maitlin and the others chattered excitedly behind us, Toto explained to me that Langa had one of the highest HIV rates in South Africa. On any given week, he said, there are forty burials in a township of two hundred and fifty thousand.

There are contrasts of wealth and poverty in the States, especially in L.A., but somehow it never feels as stark to me as it does in South Africa. When we reached Langa, a hush fell over the van. I almost felt sorry for the passengers trying to process the visual whiplash of African poverty. They sat close to the windows, gaping.