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Molly brightens up in recognition. “Kay! Good to see you. Say … you know Liam?”
Liam feels his face warm and thinks of that old famousCasablancaline.Of all the gin joints ….
Kay Darcy circles around. Her thick black hair is pulled back in a ponytail, she’s wearing jeans and a button-front blue blouse, and her smile is engaging yet sharp.
“Liam?” she asks sweetly.
He smiles. “Yes, Molly, we know each other.”
Kay says, “Once upon a time we were husband and wife. Before his job conflicted with my job, being aPostreporter.”
The night quickly takes an odd shift with Molly suddenly remembering she has to meet some friends at another bar, and Liam finds himself with his ex-wife, Kay, whom he hasn’t seen in at least eight months.
Kay cheerfully sits down across from him and says, “How far did you get?”
“Apparently not far enough,” Liam says. “Is this your new hobby, interfering in my dating life?”
His ex-wife laughs. “She’s a good girl, smart about advertising and income stream and internet clicks, but not smart enough to deal with a guy like you, Liam.”
“And what kind of guy am I?”
“Oh,” she says, “let’s not play that song again. We both know the music and lyrics by heart. Let’s talk about other things. How’re your mom and dad?”
“Doing all right, enjoying the sunshine and their gated community in Florida,” he says, once again remembering how thosebrown eyes and tanned complexion—and, to be honest, those sweet curves—utterly entranced him the first time they had met. It had been at a Saturday seminar at Georgetown University run by the State Department on emerging economies in West Africa, and by evening’s end, he had made two acquisitions: her phone number and a healthy dislike for any emerging economies.
“And yours?” he asks.
“Still waiting for me to leave journalism and get a real job,” she sighs. “They don’t like having their daughter being a quote, enemy of the people, unquote. Mom and Dad want me to move to California, find a job in Silicon Valley, and make a gazillion dollars, so I can support Mom in the way Dad can’t.”
He smiles at Kay’s wit, recalling the six-month frenzy of their early relationship, followed by two years of pretending to be an up-and-coming power couple—her in journalism, him at the Agency—until her working late nights and weekends and his long absences slowly rotted everything, like an underground stream washing away a home’s foundation.
“Buy you a drink?” he asks.
She pats his hand. “Oh, aren’t you the sweet devil. No, I’m meeting someone here for dinner.”
“A date?”
She smiles. “How about none of your damn business?”
Liam says, “Ouch, good point. How are things at thePost?”
Kay shrugs, looks around at the crowded bar, and Liam feels a slight pang for the woman he had wooed and loved and promised to spend the rest of his days with, now here, looking for someone new to roll in.
She says, “Oh, you know how it is. Trying to report stories when nobody wants to talk to you. Trying to determine if a source is leaking you information because they want to see the truth come out, or wants to back-stab somebody on the same floor where they work. Trying to defend the First Amendment when so many peoplehave given up on it, doing my part to ensure democracy doesn’t die in darkness, trying not to forget filing my expense reports.”
“Makes for a full day.”
“Sure does, sport,” Kay says. “And you? Subverting freedom anywhere?”
“That was last month,” Liam says. “Right now, just following my oath of office, defending the nation against all enemies, foreign and domestic.”
Her eyes flash at his last sentence. “Funny you should mention that.”
Oh, God,he thinks,not again. During their marriage, Kay always teased and needled him about becoming a source for her or somebody else at thePost, and the fiftieth or so time she had tried, it had resulted in a night-long vicious fight that turned out to be the first of many.
“Kay …”
“Come on, Liam, hear me out,” she goes on. “Covering the military and intelligence agencies, you hear a lot of rumors, a lot of chaff, a lot of crap. Just help me out.”