The Search by Christiane Heggan

Author:Christiane Heggan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: MIRA Books
Published: 2013-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Twenty-Five

With one eye on the TV screen and the other on the front door of Tavern on the Square, Jake sipped his beer. His mind kept wandering back to the heated kiss he and Syd had exchanged earlier. The lady, he thought without much surprise, was beginning to get under his skin.

That was something he hadn’t experienced for a long time. Until now his life had been simple, orderly and had consisted of two major elements. Work and play. If playtime included an enjoyable woman, as it often did, all the better. Those brief relationships worked because none of the women expected more from him than he could give.

So what was it about Sydney Cooper that had him so hot and bothered? Sure she was beautiful, smart and fun to be with. But so were hundreds of other women, yet none had complicated his life the way this one was threatening to. He had even begun to consider the possibility of a long-distance relationship. Maybe he could buy the apartment on Washington Square he was renting and spend his R&Rs in Philly. Or Syd could fly down to Baton Rouge on weekends.

Or maybe she wasn’t interested in any kind of relationship with him and his problems would be solved. Maybe.

A cold draft interrupted his thoughts and he glanced toward the door as a young couple entered the bar. He wondered if Victor had given up on him. He hadn’t heard from his former commander since their last encounter and he was beginning to think that maybe he had overdone it.

At three-thirty, as North Carolina prepared to meet UCLA in the second round, Jake left his half-finished beer on the counter and went into the men’s room to give Ramirez an update.

“Remind me again how all this waiting around is for the good of my country?” he asked when the agent answered.

“You won’t have to wait much longer. Victor just entered.”

When Jake returned to the busy bar, he found his glass gone and his stool occupied by a loudmouth demanding to be served.

Before he could ask the guy to split, the bartender pointed at a table in the back. “That gentleman over there said for you to join him.”

Jake turned to see Victor sitting at a window table. He walked over to him, but remained standing. “You’re beginning to be a pain in the ass, you know that?”

“Persistence is one of my many virtues.”

“What do you want now?”

“Same thing as I did the last time I was here—to talk. Come on, don’t be a poor sport.” He gave the vacant chair a shove with his foot. “Sit down. Your beer is getting warm.”

Jake held back a sigh of annoyance and sat down, wondering again if he was overdoing it. “Of all the bars in Philadelphia,” he said on impulse, “you had to walk into mine.”

At the famous, although slightly altered, phrase from the movie Casablanca, Victor chuckled. “Cute, but not very original, Captain.”

Jake drained what was left of his beer. “I don’t get out much.

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