Just One Night Part 14

"This is Keystone Funeral Home calling-"

"Thanks anyway but I don't plan to die for a while."

Weren't there enough deaths in the world? Did they have to troll for business among the young and healthy? He looked at his leg. Maybe this was targeted marketing after all.

"Mr. Kla.s.sen, I'm calling about Agnes Neeson. Your grandmother, I believe."

"Oh." Funeral home. Gran. He hated thinking of them together. He needed to end this call. "Didn't your bill get paid? Her lawyer took care of all the bills."

"Yes, payment was received. We've got her ashes. Mr. Kla.s.sen, you can come by anytime during office hours to pick them up."

"Her ashes? My grandmother's ashes?" He knew there'd been a celebration of her life shortly after she died. He'd never thought there were ashes somewhere waiting for a home. "What am I supposed to do with them?"

"Whatever you'd like, sir. We do have a memorial field. Your grandmother's ashes would be buried under a tasteful plaque. We'd be happy to discuss placing your loved one in our memorial garden at your leisure."

A plaque in a field? He couldn't imagine anything worse. His grandmother wasn't going to end up in the middle of a lawn in a row of similar plaques, the last resting place of those with no imagination or a family who couldn't be bothered to scatter the ashes somewhere meaningful.

"Thanks. I'll pick them up."

His first instinct was to call Hailey and talk to her about the ashes. How had she done this to him? Turned him from an independent man who made his own decisions to someone who wanted to ask her where he should put his grandmother's remains? A woman she'd never even met?

The bizarre thing was that he was certain she'd have the right idea.

13.

JULIA SPENT A MISERABLE evening deleting every single one of the emails from the guy she now referred to as her scammer.

Inevitably she couldn't simply delete the emails, not without reading each message over again. Nor could she put his photos in her computer's trash bin, not without gazing longingly at the man she'd believed was writing to her.

In the time since she'd discovered she'd been scammed she'd done research on the internet, something she should have done earlier, and learned there was an entire industry based on men creating fake personas to lure unwary women-such as herself-into sending them money.

The horror stories she'd read had practically made her hair stand up. Women had sold jewelry, antiques and family heirlooms to send more and more money to these men who professed love and made promises for the future if only they could send another thousand dollars for airfare or five thousand to pay for urgent medical attention-or some other bogus reason.

Once they'd taken the initial bait these women often went into debt to keep their dream alive. It was ludicrous, these seemingly rational women sending their life savings off to men who didn't exist. How could they be so stupid? Now she knew.

Julia understood two things. One: there is no escaping the foolishness a woman will stoop to if she believes she's in love. And two: she, Julia, had to accept she wasn't as smart as she thought she was.

She knew in her deepest heart that there'd been a moment when she'd actually considered sending him the money, so deeply had she bought into the fantasy of him and of them together. That's probably what made her the maddest, knowing she'd been manipulated in the most humiliating manner and by someone who operated on the other side of the world and was virtually untouchable. All she could do was report her story to the internet dating site and admit to being one more fool for love.

Even as she accepted that she was a dupe, still she reread all the emails. Now that she knew the truth, she could see there was a certain generic tone to them. He'd been awfully quick to profess his affection for someone he'd never met.

And, gritting her teeth, she realized she'd been even quicker to accept his professions as genuine.

And those photos!

The guy whose pictures were so hot she worried he would be too good-looking for her, they were photos of a model, the likeness stolen and used to lure her.

She knew she should rip the Band-Aid off, chuck the emails and the photos and empty her computer's trash bin.

She knew that.

Still, she tortured herself going through it all again. It was like looking at photos of a great vacation or studying pictures of someone you've loved who's died. That's how she felt. She experienced the bittersweet sadness of remembering past happiness. Because she had been happy. She'd already written the story in her head. Their first date, the first kiss.

How many idle moments had she spent wondering when they'd first make love and where it would happen?

Fool!

After wallowing in her own misery for as long as she could stand, she did what had to be done. Deleted the emails and the photos into the trash. Purged the guy from her life. Or the fantasy out of her life.

It was early evening, and she felt twitchy and out of sorts. Maybe just to torture herself more, she logged on to the dating site and checked to see if anyone had tried to contact her. She had an email from a guy who appeared to have spread his net pretty wide since his home address was in Portland, Oregon, and she had no interest in a long-distance relations.h.i.+p. She'd just had one with a Nigerian and that hadn't gone so well.

She deleted Mr. Portland. And noticed the initial message from John was still in her dating-site inbox. She clicked on his profile, which was still active.

John wasn't romantic or exciting; she'd never worry that he was too good-looking for her and he didn't make her nervous with trying to make a good impression. He was a nice man who was alone and she was a nice woman who was alone. Maybe she should take him up on his offer of dinner or a movie. Anything to get out of her apartment and out of her own head.

Before she could talk herself out of what was probably a truly terrible idea, she'd dug out his card and called him. He answered right away. After she identified herself she didn't know what to say next. She fumbled around a bit and then said, "I'm having a lousy day. I was wondering if you'd like to go out and get some dinner with me? Or a drink or something."

There was a pause on his end and she closed her eyes, wis.h.i.+ng she'd never dreamed up this stupid idea. What if he said no? Could she stand being rejected by somebody she wasn't even interested in?

Then he said, "I'm finis.h.i.+ng something up. I could be free in an hour. Would that work for you?"

She was so relieved she said, "Oh, thank you."

He chuckled, but in an understanding way. "Day was that bad, huh? You like sus.h.i.+?"

"Love it."

"You know Sus.h.i.+ Master?"

"I've never been there but I'll find it."

He gave her quick directions, then said, "Great. I'll meet you there at eight."

"Looking forward to it." When she hung up she found, to her surprise, that she was.

Since John was nice enough to accept a pity date with her she vowed not to be late. She was leaving her apartment only a few minutes after she'd planned to when she pa.s.sed her computer. She took a step past it toward the door, then stopped.

"Do it!" she commanded herself out loud.

Without giving herself time for any foolish last thoughts, she emptied her trash and turned off her computer. A tiny pang of grief hit her when she knew the photos, emails and the dreams she'd spun around them, were gone forever.

AFTER SHE PARKED, she headed into the restaurant a respectable five minutes late. John was already sitting at a table, a beer in front of him. "You were early," she complained, when she settled herself across from him.

"No. You were late."

"Five minutes? That's on time in my books."

He shook his head. "How many planes have you missed?"

She made a big production of picking up the menu and opening it. A vast selection of rolls and sas.h.i.+mi and platters met her eyes. "What's good here?"

A waitress appeared. "Would you like something to drink?"

"Vodka tonic," she said, and then realized she didn't need to be on a diet anymore. She didn't plan to get naked with the cute blond guy since the closest she'd ever get to him would be seeing him on a billboard or a magazine ad somewhere. Thus, her caloric intake was her business. "No. Wait. I'll have a beer also." She gestured to his gla.s.s. "Whatever he's having."

"Sapporo?"

"Perfect."

Then she closed her menu. "Why don't we get a plate of a.s.sorted sus.h.i.+ and go wild."

"Sounds good to me."

She glanced around and found the decor to be pretty standard, but clean and full of clients, many of them Asian, on a Tuesday night, which suggested the food was particularly good.

John's hair hung over his forehead in a straight bang as though his mother had cut it using a bowl. His s.h.i.+rt was old, out of date and too short in the sleeves.

But he was here. And she was grateful.

"So, you had a lousy day."

"I did.'

There was a pause.

"Anything you want to talk about?"

"No."

"Okay."

There was another pause. She tried to think of something to talk about that was neutral and didn't involve the weather, which would be pathetic. She got the sense he was doing the same thing.

She let out a breath. "I did an unbelievably stupid thing, and I didn't want to be alone tonight to brood."

"Hey, don't beat yourself up. We all do stupid things."

"I never thought I'd be the kind of person to fall for... Oh, heck, I might as well just tell you." And so she did.

The whole sad, sorry tale.

"I'm sorry," he said when she'd finished her story.

"That's all you have to say?"

"What do you want me to say?"

"I don't know. Make me feel better, I guess."

Their sus.h.i.+ platter arrived and he gestured to her to go first. She chose a California roll.

He went for the salmon, handling his chopsticks like a pro. He might dress like a goof but at least he could go out for sus.h.i.+ without making a fool of himself.

He certainly liked his wasabi, she noticed, as she watched him eat his roll. When he'd finished chewing and swallowed, he sat back and regarded her. "I think a lot of people go into online dating thinking they're going to meet the perfect partner. Maybe, though, there isn't a perfect partner. Maybe we need to be more open to trying new people, to thinking that it's okay to settle for someone you like who can fulfill a few of your needs without some romantic notion that there's a perfect match out there."

"You're saying that I bought into a fantasy."

"Absolutely. Romantic movies and Valentine's Day cards, all kinds of fiction revolves around the idea that there's a missing half of us. That we'll find that other person and wow, fireworks! We'll be happy forevermore." He chose a dynamite roll. "It's so bogus."

"What if it isn't bogus? What if there is a perfect match?"

He stared at her, his food halfway to his mouth. "You can't still believe that?"

"I don't know," she said, kind of embarra.s.sed. "I want to believe it. In spite of all that's happened. In spite of the fact that I'm...not as young as I used to be, I still believe there's a perfect someone out there for me. Don't you?"

"No, I don't. I think that all you can hope for is not to be lonely. At least some of the time."

"That's so depressing."

He shrugged. "I think of it as realistic."

"Let's get realistic. Tell me about your dating success. It's got to be so much easier being a man. There are so many more women in Seattle, you must have your pick of nice ones."

"Oh, you'd be surprised." He grabbed a piece of pickled ginger deftly with chopsticks. Then glanced up at her. "Do you really want to hear this?"

"Yes. I do. I think we both know there wasn't any chemistry between us. I like the idea of having a male friend I can talk to about this stuff."

"It seems strange."

"After what I told you, nothing you could say would shock me. Really."

"Well, I wasn't scammed, at least not so far. So I suppose that's positive. Otherwise, online dating has been a pretty dismal experience."

She thought of the way she'd ditched him so quickly. Realized that he was a really nice man. What he needed most was a makeover.

Or someone who could see past the bad hair, the worse clothes, the outdated gla.s.ses.

She really hoped there was a nice woman out there for John. He deserved her.