Four
 “I thought we’d go to San Clemente.”
“I thought we were going to Solana Beach.”
“Oh, the surfing’s better up the coast this time of year. It’s not actually up the coast but west, further out in the ocean. Catch more waves out there.”
“Okay.” She put her sunglasses on and relaxed, letting the fresh air and sunshine flow around her along with really clear wrap-around music from an incredibly good stereo system. By coincidence, her favorite radio station was on, playing a mix of contemporary jazz and classic rock. “Each of these songs is so great! I love them all, and I’ve never heard them this clear.”
“European engineering.” He glanced at her sideways, not smiling, as if not sure she understood.
“So are you an engineer?”
“No, I told you, sales.”
“And what do you sell?”
“Big machinery. Farm equipment, the generators that power up an airliner, that kind of stuff.”
She remembered the card. “Who are Guthrie and Donaldson?”
“Partners.” He looked tanned and suddenly businesslike, as if running the complexities of his business through his mind while dressed to play on the beach. “Guthrie is old—50—and he inherited from his father. Donaldson is my age. Guthrie’s the engineer, but he’s fat and gross and can’t sell. Donaldson runs the business. He’s a little wind-up twit. Dots his i’s and crosses his t’s.”
“Sounds like you guys don’t like each other.”
“I can’t say we’re crazy about each other. But we’re a team that works. Two hundred million in gross revenues last year, huh?”
“Hmmm.” She noticed a copy of TheWall Street Journal on the floor. She unfolded it—it was a week old—and smoothed out the financial section. She scanned down the New York Stock Exchange listings, column by column, to where GTD should be. It wasn’t. “You guys aren’t listed.”
“We don’t trade publicly. We obtain our funding from private investors, Sylvie. Do you know much about finance?”
“Some. My minor was accounting, but I’m afraid I’m just your basic software engineer.”
“And a beautiful one at that.”
“Oh come now.”
“We have very large institutional investors, like insurance companies, and some private investors.” He named several big names that she associated with fabulous fortunes. “All those people,” he said, “are not going to gamble in the sort of bull pit, if you will, that the hoi polloi throw their money. These are old fortunes, and we’re rock solid.”
On the beach near San Clemente, they ran down hand in hand to the water. There she pulled her hand away, and he seemed respectful of her distance. He was like that all day. They swam, surfed, swam again, ran in the sand, collapsed tiredly, napped in the sun, then went for lunch in a fine little restaurant near the beach. They drank margaritas and ate from a salad bar that included chopped fresh-roasted chicken breast and a whole variety of good things. He paid by credit card and then they strolled arm in arm on the beach. Never once did his hands roam where they shouldn’t, not even a fingertip.
At dusk, he kissed her lightly on the mouth as the sun set in a fiery ball over the Pacific Ocean. She kept a fairly neutral position, with her hands against his arms and her face upraised, but her eyes open. He laughed almost imperceptibly, inwardly, and shook her very gently as if to loosen her up. His inward laugh infected her and she laughed too, closing her eyes as his lips touched hers. She sensed the strength in him, and the holding back. She felt the cords in his arms and imagined he could be very passionate. For the first time, that thought nibbled interestedly at the wall of her resistance. Not resistance, she decided, but indifference borne of hard work and long hours. Too much. Too much. Gotta loosen up, she thought, I’ll only live once.
In the car on the way home, she said: “Thanks for a wonderful day.”
“I really enjoyed it too.”
She stared out at the passing lights on Interstate 5 headed south into San Diego and thought out loud. “I have two weeks before I start a really big project, and you won’t see me for a few months.”
“Oh?”
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Copyright © 1996 by John T. Cullen, Clocktower Books. All Rights Reserved.
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