Flynn, still standing at the landing, fixed his eyes on Rowland Tomlinson. “I’ve come for my lady.” Then he looked at me. “Cassie, are you all right?”
“Of course she’s all right!” Rowland Tomlinson declared, his tone indignant. “Why shouldn’t she be?”
Flynn kept his eyes on Rowland Tomlinson and repeated, “Cassie, are you all right?”
I was startled, but I tried not to show it. “Yes,” I said.
“Then are you ready to go?”
“Yes,” I said again, and pushed past Rowland Tomlinson. “I’m finished here.”
“But, Cassie, we’ve got work to do,” objected Rowland Tomlinson.
“I’m finished,” I said once more. I gathered my coat, my other few things, and left with Flynn, leaving Rowland Tomlinson standing speechless at my desk.
I waited until we were outside before I stopped Flynn and asked, “What are you doing here?”
“Like I told the man, I came to get you. Justine got worried. She asked me to come. She also called your Deacon Barnett to see if he was here. She found out your boss had told him not to come today. Justine told the deacon to get right over here and unlock the door. When she called me, I got a little worried too.”
I stared at Flynn. “Why would you be worried? You don’t even know me.”
“True. Come on, let’s go to the car.”
“I was thinking I would take the bus,” I said.
Flynn glanced back at the office building. “You sure you want to do that? Your Mr. Tomlinson could come out any minute and see you standing there. You plan on going back to his house?”
“He’s not my Mr. Tomlinson, and no, I do not plan on going back there, least not tonight.” Then I just stood there, thinking what I should do next. I looked up and down Central Avenue. Most of the businesses on the block and most of the stores had already closed for the day, but the theaters were open and the jazz and other nightclubs soon would be. A whole different crowd would be on the street.
Flynn seemed to read my mind. “Why don’t you come with me and you can figure out what you want to do.”
He held out his hand to me. I didn’t take it, but I went with him. I had no other place to go. Once inside the car, I thanked him for coming for me. He smiled that fantastic smile and began to drive. As I tried to think of a place for Flynn to take me, I took note of Flynn’s car, the beauty of the upholstery and the design of the steering panel. “What kind of car is this? I’ve never seen one like it before.”
Flynn glanced over, looking surprised that those were my next words. “Mercedes.”
“Never heard of it, and I thought I knew all the car models. All my brothers love cars, talk about them all the time.”
“It’s a German make. I saw a couple like it while I was over in Germany, wanted to get one. It’s secondhand, about eight years old, had to fix it up, but it’ll do for me.”
He said nothing further and we rode in silence until I said, “Flynn, I don’t know where to go. I can’t spend the night at the Tomlinsons’, but I’ll need to let Mrs. Tomlinson know I won’t be home.”
“You want to go by there now to talk to her?”
I shook my head. “Mr. Tomlinson might come while I’m there. I don’t want to see the man and I don’t want to hurt Mrs. Tomlinson. She’s been good to me. Besides, I don’t know what I could tell her, that her husband was coming on to me?”
“That’s the truth, isn’t it?”
“Yes, but I can’t tell her that. I need to call her though. She’ll want to know why I won’t be home, where I’m staying.”
“Tell her you’re staying with a friend.”
“She’ll want to know who that friend is.”
“You can tell her you’re staying with me.”
“I don’t think that would go over very well.”
“Then tell her you’re staying with Justine.”
“I don’t want to lie.”
“You won’t be. We’ll call Justine. She’ll make a place for you.”
I didn’t like the idea of staying with Justine and her boyfriend again, but I didn’t have much choice. I had no family in Los Angeles, no place else to go, no real friends either, no one except maybe this man.
* * *
◆ ◆ ◆
Flynn drove to a café on the other side of town. He said we would call from the café and also have dinner. When I objected to dinner, he said, “You’ve seen Justine’s place. You think she’ll have dinner waiting when you get there?”
I relented. I was hungry and I admitted to myself that I would rather be with Flynn for as long as possible than without him at Justine’s apartment.
The restaurant was small, almost like a big kitchen, and everyone there seemed to be Mexican. As we entered, some of the diners turned curiously to look at us. I felt out of place; it was as if we were interrupting a family dinner. A middle-aged man with a mane of luxurious silver hair came rushing over with a wide grin on his face. He spoke in rapid Spanish and embraced Flynn. Flynn returned the embrace, greeting the man in fluent Spanish. He addressed the man as Papá Miguel. Then he introduced me.
The gentleman was Señor Peña, proprietor of the restaurant, and he greeted me warmly, taking my hand in both of his before calling out to someone in a back room. Within moments a woman and several children emerged, and they greeted Flynn with the same enthusiasm as the man had done, hugging him warmly and smiling sweetly at me. Two young men also emerged and hugged Flynn. They were the Peñas’ eldest sons, Jorge and Eduardo. Then the woman, Señora Peña, speaking only Spanish, gestured toward her kitchen and even I understood she had to get back to it. The children lingered around Flynn until their father shooed them back to the kitchen. Then, after a few words from Flynn, he led us to a large desk set behind a colorful screen in the corner of the room. It was obvious to me it was his own personal desk, with papers stacked high. A telephone was on it.
“Here, you sit,” Señor Peña said to me, rolling back the desk chair. “You can make your calls from here.”
“Thank you,” I said.
Señor Peña smiled widely. “When you finish, hijo, you come over to the table in the corner. I’ll fix it up real nice for you and your lady. And I’ll bring you a feast for two.” He hurried off, and for a moment my gaze lingered after him as I relished how he referred to me.
“I’ll call Justine first,” Flynn said, picking up the phone. After a couple of minutes of explanation to Justine of what had happened at Tomlinson’s office, he hung up. “She said she won’t wait up for us, but you can sleep on the sofa for tonight. I have a key, so that’s not a problem. We get there when we get there.”