Under Cover Of Darkness by Elizabeth White

Author:Elizabeth White
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Steeple Hill
Published: 2005-12-27T05:00:00+00:00

Face dripping with sweat, his gym shorts and T-shirt soaked, Jack leaned against the back wall of court number three at the seminary rec facility. To his surprise, he’d found that the preacher boy might be a foot shorter and nearly that much bigger around, but he was a dynamo on the court.

“Hey, muchacho, you got the legs left to walk over to the Union for a drink?” Santos, breathing just as hard as Jack, waggled his empty water bottle.

Jack grinned and mopped his face with a towel. “I could carry you piggyback, you sissy.”

Trading good-natured insults, the two men stepped out into the afternoon sunshine. Santos walked along, swinging his racquet and jabbering in Spanish flavored with Puerto Rican slang. He apparently didn’t care that Jack did more listening and head-nodding than responding.

“Your Spanish is really good for somebody that grew up in the States,” Santos commented as they walked up the broad steps of the Student Union.

“The education of the barrios,” Jack said dryly. He stopped and looked up into the vast atrium of the rotunda, with its marble floor and ornate brass chandelier dripping with crystal tears. An enormous leather-bound Bible rested in ancient dignity atop an antique table under the grand curving staircase.

“Have the people in your church seen this place?” Jack pictured the tiny, ’60s–era two-bedroom apartment the Santos family inhabited and the hearty but cheap food served by efficient Señora Santos.

“They’re proud that their pastor is about to graduate from such a fine institution.”

“And will they continue to be proud when their pastor skips on to greener pastures?”

Santos’s smile broadened. “I’m not going anywhere.” He pushed open a glass door leading into a snack bar, where he bought two large fountain drinks. They sat at a table under a broad bank of windows looking out onto a grassy field.

Jack drank deeply and sighed with satisfaction. “So explain to me,” he said, eyeing Ramón across the table, “why a man would come all the way from Puerto Rico to graduate from a place like this, and then waste it on a little bilingual mission church.”

“Same reason the Son of God came from Heaven to a desert to preach to a bunch of fishermen and tax collectors and prostitutes.”

Jack eyed Santos with amusement. “You are good, you know that, Preacher?”

Santos grinned. “So my wife tells me. I’m glad you came today, even if it was on account of Meg.”

Jack made a face. “Obvious, huh?”

“As a tick on a white dog.”

“There’s something about her all right.” Jack shrugged. “I’ve never been to a Hispanic church just like this one.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.” Ramón grinned. “I’d like to know what impressed you—” Santos smiled “—besides Señorita Meg.”

“I don’t know exactly. The music’s great. Never heard people sing like that.” Jack hesitated. “Who was the guy with the guitar? He’s really good.”

“Yeah, he is. Name’s Oscar de Fuentes.”

Jack sat up. “I thought he looked familiar! He played shortstop for the Rangers, I think, five years ago!”

Santos’s smile quirked one side of his mustache.

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