Bill Pronzini - The Crimes of Jordan Wise

"Not as often as I'd like to be," I said.

"Me, either. Who is? Well, Bert is. Thinks he is, anyway."

"Who would Bert be?"

"The fellow I came with. But he seems to have disappeared."

"Boyfriend?"

"Jury's still out on that. Why? Are you interested?"

"Yes," I said. Bold. And I'd never been bold before. She brought that out in me right from the first. "I'd like to see you again."

"Are you asking me for a date?"

"Lunch, dinner, a movie, whatever you like."

She thought about it, her head tipped to one side. "Well, maybe," she said. "Jury's still out on that, too."

"When will there be a verdict?"

"After due deliberation. Which just began, so it might take a while. You never know with juries."

"How do I find out?"

That was as far as it went. She didn't have a chance to respond, because another voice said loudly, "Annalise, there you are," and a blue-eyed blond guy, half a head taller and a yard wider than me, came barreling up. He didn't even glance at me; as far as he was concerned, I wasn't even there. "I've been looking all over for you. Come on, there's somebody I want you to meet." He took hold of her arm and started tugging on it.

It cought me flatfooted. I didn't have a chance to say anything more. She smiled at me and shrugged as if to say "What can you do?" and let him drag her off into the crowd.

I felt a rush of anger at the blond guy. Asshole! Yanking on her like that, taking her away! But the anger didn't last long. The dull acceptance that had characterized so much of my life replaced it. So what's the big deal? I thought. She'd probably have said no anyway. Forget it. Forget her.

But I hung around the reception for another half hour, working my way through the crowd. Annalise was gone, or at least I didn't see her anywhere. Finally I left and drove home, feeling flat, putting the flatness down to the crush of strangers even though she was still on my mind. She stayed on my mind the rest of the day, and I dreamed about her that night.

Forget her? Even then, at some level, I knew I never would.

It took me nearly a week to work up the nerve to call her. I would've done it sooner if she'd had a listed phone number, but she didn't and nobody I knew who'd been at the reception knew her. I was reluctant to call her at her job. Amthor Associates frowned on personal calls on company time, and I thought Kleinfelt's Department Store would probably feel the same. But it was either that or give up without trying, so I rode the elevator to the lobby on my morning coffee break and called Kleinfelt's on one of the public phones.

She answered with her last name and a Miss in front of it. I identified myself and said that we'd met at the Sanderson reception on Saturday—"Lost and found, if you remember."

"I remember," she said. Not as if she were glad to hear from me, but friendly enough. "I didn't have that much champagne."

"I was wondering," I said, "if the jury has come in yet."

"Jury?" Then she got it and it made her laugh. "Oh, the jury. Bight. Well, let's see. Which case were you interested in?"

"Mainly the one involving me."

"Mmm. Just now, as a matter of fact."

"What's the verdict?"

"In favor of the plaintiff, I think. Why don't you call me again tonight to confirm it?"

She gave me her home number. And when I called her that night, she confirmed the favorable verdict. She was busy Friday and Saturday, but Sunday would be all right for dinner as long as it wasn't a late evening.

She lived in an eight-unit apartment building near Golden Gate Park and the University of California Medical Center. I picked her up there and we went to Castagnola's on Fisherman's Wharf for dinner and then to the Top of the Mark for drinks. Annalise wore white again—a white flared skirt and a pale-blue-and-white blouse under a white jacket. If white is a color, it was her favorite, with pale blue a close second. She drew a lot of male eyes. Being with her made me feel proud and privileged and a little possessive, feelings I'd never had with any other woman.

It wasn't like most first dates: there was no awkwardness between us. She was as easy to talk to as she had been at the wedding reception—naturally gregarious, so comfortable in her own skin she put you at ease right away. She talked freely about herself, but without the constant ego focus of a lot of attractive women. She was twenty-six. She'd grown up in Visalia, in the Central Valley. Her father, a career soldier, had been killed in Korea when she was a baby; her mother died two years later, she wouldn't say from what. She and her younger sister, Ariane, had been raised by their mother's sister—"one of those religious fanatics who quote the Bible fifty times a day and think all men are sex fiends and girls shouldn't be allowed to wear makeup or date before the age of twenty." That was the source of her dislike of Holy Rollers. The aunt had dominated her husband, treated her nieces like "a couple of heathen slaves." Annalise's sister had been brainwashed into following the same path—she ran a Christian day care center in Visalia—but Annalise had moved out and away as soon as she was of age. She'd gotten a sales clerk's job at Kleinfelt's in Fresno, showed initiative, was promoted, applied for and was given the assistant buyer's job at the store's main branch in San Francisco, and moved to the city three years ago.

She didn't like the job; she used the word "shitty" again. It was demanding, time-consuming, barely paid enough for her to afford her apartment. She was on the lookout for something better, more challenging, in the fashion industry. Not as a buyer; as a designer of women's clothing. Her ambition was to move into the world of high fashion. She'd designed dozens of outfits in her spare time, a few of which she felt were quality work, but so far she hadn't had any luck in interesting a potential buyer. Not even Kleinfelt's, she said with some bitterness.

Eventually we got around to me. My background sounded pretty mundane when I related it. When she asked what I did at Amthor, as I was afraid she would, I told her the truth. She took it well enough, but I could tell she was disappointed, that she'd hoped I was a design engineer or even a junior executive. I couldn't Ue to her, either, about whether I had ambitions to be anything other than an accountant. I had none at that time, beyond a promotion to chief accountant someday, and I said as much.

I didn't try to kiss her good-night when I took her home. I felt I was on shaky ground as it was and I didn't want to do anything that might make her like me less. When I asked if I could see her again, I half expected her to say no. But all she said was "Call me."

I waited two days. It was a big relief when she agreed to another date. Saturday night, this time—a step up on her social calendar. My self-esteem was low enough for me to wonder why a woman as attractive and desirable as Annalise would bother with somebody like me. Pity, maybe? Or maybe a quiet, average-looking numbers cruncher was a respite from the usual macho type she dated. It didn't really matter. All I cared about was seeing her again.

That night we ate at a French restaurant on the bay side of Powell Street. Drinks and dancing afterward in the Tonga Room at the Fairmont. She liked to dance close and the feel of her in my arms was as intoxicating as the mai tais we drank. The evening went well enough so that I risked a brief good-night kiss. She didn't object. "Call me," she said again before I left.

It went on like that for three months. I'd call her early in the week, and she'd tell me whether she was free and on which weekend night. Three weekends she was booked up, or said she was. I knew she dated other men; she'd been open about that. One of them was Bert, the big blond guy she'd been with at the reception. Was she sleeping with him, with any of the other men she saw? The one thing she didn't talk about was her love life, but it seemed certain she had one. She wasn't the virginal type. It made me jealous, but all I could do was bide my time and hope to be favored someday. Her game, her rules.