Читать книгу: «Girl In The Mirror», страница 2

Suddenly two young girls she knew well darted past her to hide behind the bleachers. Charlotte sat up, tense with anticipation. She marveled at how their pretty cheeks were pink with excitement. Their voices were shrill with feigned alarm.

“Come back here, Charlotte,” one of them whispered.

“They’ll see you and guess our hiding place. Hurry!”

Charlotte jumped up with a rush of joy to join them.

“Me? You want me to play?” No one ever wanted her to play.

“Hurry up!”

They were playing with her! Charlotte scurried around the green wooden bleacher and huddled with the other girls, her hands tight against her chest in excitement. She imagined her own cheeks were as pretty and pink as theirs. When the group of young boys spotted them, they pointed and charged. The girls took off, squealing in the chase.

Charlotte’s heart pounded gleefully as her little feet soared across the hard-packed grass of the playing field. She was running with them and, oh, she was fast! She could feel the wind kiss her smile and flap her dress hem against her thighs as she sprinted. Behind her she heard heavy footfall, and, feeling cocky, she looked over her shoulder teasingly. She knew she was smarter in school, and now she knew she was faster, too. The boy who chased her flushed and frowned furiously.

Charlotte’s laughter pealed and she ran harder. As she began to tire, she sensed a subtle shift in attitude. Them against her. Instead of one boy chasing her, now there were three, and they were frustrated and closing ranks. Where were the other girls?

“Hey, you’re fast,” one boy shouted with resentment.

“Like a horse,” called out another.

“Yeah, she does look like a horse.”

“Hey—Charley Horse!”

The boys burst out laughing, holding their sides and bumping shoulders as their pace slackened. They used the spontaneous nickname as a rallying call.

“Get Charley Horse!”

Little Charlotte Godowski ran hard then, as far as she could from the sound of the cruel nickname that poked fun at her face. It was hateful to be so mean. Mean, mean, mean.

Charley wasn’t her name. Her name was Charlotte. A beautiful name. Did she look like a horse? She couldn’t help how she looked…why would they say that? The name hurt and they knew it. They kept hurling it at her like stones as they chased. Charlotte felt a little afraid now, but she dug deep and ran faster. When she spotted the bleachers, she made a beeline for them. She would hide like before.

It was a dumb thing to do. She knew it the moment she ran behind them and saw that she was trapped by the chain-link fence. Like a pack of dogs they came after her, one from around the left side of the bleachers, two from the right. With cunning, they cornered her.

Charlotte moved away from the fence, instinctively allowing herself space. The boys clustered together, their young chests heaving, panting like dogs after the chase. As they stared, she saw conceit gleaming in their eyes.

The boys gathered closer. She could smell the candy on their breaths. Billy’s Keds were smeared; he had stepped in dog manure. The wind gusted, hurling the foul scent toward her. Charlotte shivered, wrinkling her nose, and searched through the slats of the bleachers to where the other schoolchildren were playing. Their high-pitched voices soared in the sky like birdcalls. They seemed so very far away. Suddenly, she felt very alone. She wanted her mother, her teacher. Where were the other girls? She didn’t like this game anymore. She didn’t want to play.

“Okay,” she said, putting out her palms. “You guys win.” She laughed, but it sounded queer, too high.

The boys looked at one another, nervously shifting their weight. Then one boy, Billy again, spoke. “If we catch you we get to pull down your pants.”

Charlotte paled and she sucked in her breath. She hadn’t heard this rule. She’d never have played the game if she’d heard this rule!

“Uh-uh, dog-doo foot,” she muttered, shaking her head and backing away with her palms turned outward against them. It was a big mistake, she thought, because she saw Billy’s eyes turn mean. “I didn’t mean it, Billy. I’m sorry. I quit this game. Okay? Please?”

Billy took the lead now. “Let’s see if she’s as ugly down there.”

Her breath stilled. Surely she hadn’t heard right. She looked at Billy with uncomprehending eyes. Ugly? How could that be? Her mama told her she was pretty. Just last night, at her bedside, her mama prayed to St. Levan for her to be pretty. No one had ever called her ugly. No! They were just being mean.

And yet…From some as yet unvisited place in her heart, Charlotte heard the whispering that it was true. For the first time in her life, at five years of age, Charlotte came face-to-face with her ugliness. Her arms slipped to her sides and she stared back at them with vulnerable eyes.

Sensing her new weakness, they were on her, pulling her to the dirt. Charlotte was filled with a panic she’d never felt before. She kicked her long, spindly legs blindly, with all her might, satisfied when she heard muffled umphs and grunts of pain. She fought hard but there were too many of them. With their sticky hands they held her down. She began to cry and beg them not to.

“No…Please…No!”

Their short, blunt nails scraped her hips as they pulled the pink flowered cotton down around her thighs. Then they looked, really looked, with their mouths hanging open, surprised that they’d actually gone through with it.

When the school bell pierced the air they all jumped back, startled, frightened by the reality of what they’d imagined. Charlotte instantly curled into a ball, tucking her thin yellow dress tight around her knees. With her face in the dirt, she hiccuped, tasting the salt of tears and the minerals of earth. She hated these boys. In the harshest jargon of a five-year-old, she shouted out, “You’re bad!”

Knowing what they’d done was wrong, the boys scuffed their shoes in the dirt in an embarrassed silence. From her level, Charlotte saw the manure still smeared on Billy’s Keds. When she looked up, she caught Billy’s expression before he turned heel and sped across the field to join the rest of the class as they filed into the school. Charlotte thought Billy had seemed horrified. It didn’t occur to her five-year-old mind that the boy may have been guilt stricken at his own behavior. All Charlotte thought was that maybe she was ugly—even down there.

Mortified, her tears cascaded down her grossly sloping chin to pool in the dirt. She hated boys. They were mean and not to be trusted. And she didn’t like the girls, either. Why didn’t they help her? She would have helped them.

Charlotte didn’t go back to school but stayed behind the bleachers until the teacher came out to fetch her and scold her for not following the bell. Charlotte told the teacher that she was sick and wanted to go home. The teacher looked at her tearstained face and believed her. It wasn’t really a lie, but Charlotte told God that she was sorry for the sin, anyway.

But she wasn’t sorry for hating the boys. She promised herself she was never going to let them hurt her again.

Two

December 1991

Charlotte, weary after a five-hour dress rehearsal of A Christmas Carol, unlocked the door of the four-room apartment she shared with her mother. The paint was chipped around the door handle and the single bulb in the hall cast a seedy pall. A home fit for Scrooge, she thought, with a resigned chuckle. She rubbed her sore throat with her mittened hand. What a hectic day. Her voice was hoarse from shouting replies to the harried director and from prompting lines to the actors, who seemed unable to memorize a single scene of dialogue. Charlotte couldn’t understand how they could be so lazy. She knew everyone’s lines; her memory was razor sharp. Everyone depended on good ol’ Charlotte to deliver. Perhaps that was part of the problem. As the stage manager, it was her job to make things easier for everyone else—and she was very good at her job.

Not that she expected to be cast in a role herself, as much as she would have loved it. She would have to remain behind the scenes. She’d accepted her fate years ago, when she accepted her deformity. The theater was in her blood, however, even if only as part-time stage manager for the local company. She was in charge of all the details no one else liked to do, a satisfying enough position for a detail kind of person like herself. She arranged dressing rooms, kept the scripts in order, stepped in for rehearsals when an actor didn’t show, and generally made nice-nice to keep everybody happy. She didn’t mind being in the background. With her looks, it was her lot in life. Her greatest, most secret thrill, however, came during the actual production when she stood offstage, her face upturned in the lights, and whispered the lines of the play with all the feeling and heart that was lacking on stage.

“Mama, I’m home!” she called out, dropping her coat on the bench by the door. She went first to her room, closed the door behind her and switched on the music, delighted with a few minutes all to herself, with no one calling her name. After undressing, she collapsed on her bed, relishing the soft comfort she had no intention of leaving till it was time to go to Sunday mass the next morning.

“Charlotte, you’re home so late!” Helena called out. The large Polish woman’s broad shoulders, already humped over from years of cleaning other people’s houses, stooped a little more in relief at seeing her only child safely home. At forty-seven, Helena Godowski’s face was as pale, translucent and crackled as a piece of her treasured bone china. But she was strong enough to lift the bulky dark wood armoire that housed the fragile dishes, and her physical strength paled when compared to her stern will.

“I know, I know, I’m sorry!” Charlotte hurried to erase the frown from her mother’s brow. “Rehearsals were crazy today, and I had to stay until everyone had their lines down pat. It’s always like this before an opening.” She ran a hand through her hair, shaking it out. “I’m pooped. I think I’ll go to bed early tonight.”

“Go to bed? But you can’t!” Helena raised the purple-and-pink plastic container that she carried under her arm. “Tonight there is nice party!” she said, her eyes bright.

“See, I brought my makeup. We will try something pretty, no?”

“Oh, no,” Charlotte groaned, her eyes closed tight in misery. Her stomach did a flip and she lost her appetite.

“The office party. I’d completely forgotten. Mom, I’d rather stay home. A Christmas Carol is on tonight. The old one with Alastair Sim. It’s the best one. And,” she added, thinking fast, “I’m so tired.”

“Movies,” Helena grumbled. “Movies and plays. Always this. You are a watcher. Day and night and never go out, except to that silly theater that doesn’t pay you enough for train fare. This is not good for you. You must live in real world, Charlotte. You can not always hide in your room. You’ll never find a husband like that.” Helena bent to pick up Charlotte’s clothing from the floor and folded the articles into a neat pile on the bed.

“Oh, Mama. I won’t find a husband at the office Christmas party. All I’ll find is a drunk.” She shuddered, rubbing her bare arms at the dismal prospect of another party of long hours sitting alone, enduring snide remarks. “Oh, all right, I’ll go,” she conceded when she saw her mother’s disappointment. “But only because Mr. Kopp sent a memo that implied we all have to show up—or else.”

“Your boss, he won’t let anything be too wild. You’ll have nice time. You’ll see.”

The image of “Fast Hands” Lou Kopp flashed through Charlotte’s mind. Her boss was the very one women worried about most. “I’ll try to have a good time,” she said with a sigh of resignation. “If I can find something to wear.” She dug through the dingy, cramped closet stuffed with old shoes, worn suits and a collection of dusty hats. Her mother never threw anything out. Everything had a little life left in it.

Making things do was the modus operandi for Charlotte and her mother. Their apartment was small and devoid of any charm, but it was located on a convenient bus line and the rent was cheap, so, like everything else, it had to make do.

If it wasn’t pretty, however, at least it was clean. Not a spot marred the old linoleum or the bland brown carpeting. Neither was there a stain on Charlotte’s old skirt or a button missing from her blouse. The pale green Formica in the kitchen might have been ugly, but it sparkled. As did Charlotte’s unpolished nails and polished shoes. And anyone who entered the narrow lobby on Harlem Avenue would tilt his head and sniff with closed eyes toward the delicious scents simmering behind apartment 2B.

“I have a good feeling about this party. You might meet someone,” Helena said with smug satisfaction. “I prayed to St. Jude.”

Charlotte rolled her eyes and turned her back to slip into an old red wool dress.

“A woman needs a man to look after her,” her mother continued. “And she must take care of him and his home. And his children. Matrimony is a holy state. A sacrament. Yah…I pray for that for you.” Her voice rose with emotion. “I don’t want for you to be alone and unhappy.”

Charlotte squeezed her hands around the hanger. In the mirror she saw herself as her mother refused to see her: an ugly, thin, twenty-year-old destined to be a back room accountant and live with her mother in this dingy apartment for the rest of her life.

“Mom,” Charlotte said, wrapping an arm around her mother’s shoulder. At just this moment, she needed to receive comfort as much as give it. “Don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself—and you. We won’t be alone. I love you.”

She bent to kiss her mother’s cheek, thinking that each time she did so, there was less fullness to her face. Her mother stiffened, patted Charlotte’s arm, then gently pushed her away.

“You better get dressed now. Pretty, okay?”

Charlotte pulled back quickly. “Pretty…” she repeated, scorched by the word. She slipped the dress over her head, groaning as the tight waistband barely squeezed over her bust then cinched her waist. Either the wool dress had shrunk or her bust had grown, because the bodice felt like a vise around her chest. Looking up she caught the grimace on her mother’s face.

“You no can wear that dress to party!”

“It seems a little small, I know….” Charlotte tried stretching the fabric out from her chest.

“A little? I can see your…you know!”

“What?” Charlotte spun around to look at herself in the full length mirror. The dress clung to her long slender frame like a second skin, outlining her full breasts in scarlet, voluptuous detail.

Her mother flushed, pointing frantically. “Ach. The tips! They stick out—like coat hooks!”

Charlotte flushed as red as her dress. Her nipples did indeed protrude from the fabric. Mortified, she hunched her shoulders forward, but it was no use. Her breasts would not be concealed. Oh, Lord, Charlotte sighed with exasperation. Why did she have to have such big ones? In the dim light of a vanity lamp, she studied her figure, appalled. Her breasts were full and her waist was small; a figure most women dreamed of.

But she was unlike most women. Her figure was her nightmare. It attracted male attention—until they raised their eyes.

“You must wear something else.”

“I don’t have anything else! Except my church dress, and I’m not going to wear that old brown thing to a fancy party. I just won’t go.”

“No, no, you go. Maybe a jacket. To cover yourself. Is a sin to provoke.”

Provocation was the last thing she wanted. When Charlotte tried on a somber black suit jacket over the offensive dress, her mother visibly relaxed and nodded in satisfaction.

“It will do. You can wear jacket so nice. Like your father.”

“I hope he didn’t have a chest like this,” she muttered.

“Don’t talk like that about your father! He was a fine man. A fine man,” her mother repeated, smoothing out her sweater like ruffled feathers. “From a fine family in Warsaw. What grand house they had. And servants! And his mother—oh, such a lady. There was a woman who never had to lift a finger.”

Charlotte turned away and slipped off the jacket. It didn’t flatter the dress but, like everything else, it would have to make do. They were poor, had always been poor. What value was there in coming from a family that had once upon a time been wealthy? It was just another fairy tale.

“You are so like your father,” her mother continued wistfully, happy in her memories.

“But I don’t look like him.”

“What you know how he looked?”

Charlotte shrugged. Even as a child she’d thought it odd that there were no photographs of her father. All her classmates had albums full of relatives. She hadn’t even one.

“You told me he was handsome.” Her comment floated between them, like a challenge.

“You are smart like him,” her mother amended, picking at her sweater. “And you have his nose. A strong, noble nose. Still, you have my eyes, your grandmother Sophie’s eyes.”

Listening, Charlotte’s gaze traveled in the mirror up from her full chest, beyond her thin shoulders and long neck to her face. It wasn’t often that she suffered the study of her own reflection. Staring back were the large, wide, vivid blue eyes under dark, finely arched brows that resembled her mother’s. And the straight, narrow nose of her father.

“But from whom,” Charlotte asked bitterly, “did I get this grossly sloping chin and these drooping lips? Who do I have to thank for these fine features?”

“Hush, Charlotte,” her mother pleaded, her face ashen.

“You got your looks from God.”

Charlotte swallowed her retort and lowered her head, ashamed for the angry thoughts she’d just had about God. Besides, she didn’t want to upset her mother with useless anger. After all, what choice did her mother have but to accept her only daughter’s ugliness as God’s will? Charlotte’s own daily prayer was that she herself could accept the face.

“Someday,” her mother said, beginning the phrase that was more a prayer in this Polish Catholic house than the Our Father. “You will meet Someone. A fine man who will love you for all your good qualities. And you are a good girl, Charlotte.”

Charlotte pressed her lips together and turned away from the mirror. There would be no Someone. Not for her. “The jacket won’t fit under my coat,” she said. “I’ll carry it.”

Her mother closed her mouth and looked wearily at her hands. “Yes,” she said softly. “The jacket will be fine. Nice girls don’t need to advertise.”

Charlotte forgot her jacket. In her mind’s eye she could see the black wool lying on the bench beside the front door. How could she be so forgetful? she thought, mentally kicking herself. One minute of stupidity meant hours of agony.

She’d wave at her boss, enough to let him know she was here, then duck out. Charlotte peered in through the entrance of the banquet hall. Round tables, decorated with garish faux silk poinsettias festooned with glittering red and green ribbons, were assembled on an enormous revolving floor.

“Come on in!” someone shouted from the crowd. Charlotte took a small step into the room, clutching her coat close to the neck. Beyond, revelers slowly traveled a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree tour of Chicago’s skyline to the tune of “A Holly Jolly Christmas.”

Everyone was there, from the top management to the lowly file clerks. McNally and Kopp was a small accounting firm, but when you multiplied that number times two, it didn’t take great math skills to know that at least one hundred people were assembled to celebrate the holidays. And from the sounds of it, most of the guests were already on their second or third drinks.

In the far corner, a group of men in suits gathered at the bar. Between laughs and swallows, their eyes scanned the room with the hungry look of animals on the hunt.

“Charley!”

Charlotte cringed at the name. Looking up, she saw Judy Riker, her office manager, approaching wearing a peekaboo dress of red sequins and straps that barely held her together. Boy, oh boy, Charlotte thought with a smile. Her mother would be shocked to see so much of Judy’s “you knows” exposed. The men at the bar noticed, too, and Charlotte saw them lean over and comment to one another as Judy passed.

“I was just leaving,” Charlotte said as Judy walked up.

“Leaving? Nonsense. You’ve just arrived. Come on, don’t be such a wallflower. It’s time you had some fun.” Judy coaxed a reluctant Charlotte out of her coat. “My, what a nice dress,” she said, barely disguising her surprise.

“You look nice in red, Charley. You should wear it more often instead of that baggy black and gray you always wear. People always ask if you’re in mourning. With your long blond hair, red is definitely your color.”

“It’s Christmas,” she responded, blushing.

“Well, Merry Christmas, Charley! Come on. Let’s go get a drink. It’s a cash bar, those cheap bastards. You’d think they’d spring for Christmas. What the hell, it’s my treat. Let’s tie one on for Ol’ St. Nick.”

Judy bought Charlotte a white wine, then, her job as hostess done, disappeared into the crowd. Alone again, Charlotte clutched the stem of her wineglass like a lifeline and tracked her path to a table. Her heart sank. She had to walk past the bar.

Charlotte had learned early in life that an ugly face drew as many comments from a group of guys as a pretty one. Maybe more. Hunching her shoulders forward, she let her hair slide over her face in a practiced move of camouflage. She imagined that she was on stage, marked her point across the floor, then, eyes on the point, she proceeded in a straight line across the floor to the backbeat of “Babes in Toyland.”

As she passed the bar, the rowdy men quieted. She held her breath and invoked St. Anthony the Great to protect her from swine. Hurrying her pace, her hands clenching and unclenching the stem of her glass, she found her seat and slunk quickly down into the upholstery. Just when she was muttering thanks to St. Anthony, she saw a man swerving toward her. She sucked in her breath and averted her face.

“Excuse me,” he said at her side. “Have we met?”

It was her boss, Lou Kopp. A chill ran down her spine and she sunk farther into her seat, bringing her hand to her face. From the bar she heard the jeers: “Way to go, Lou.”

She felt like a trapped animal, but years of ridicule had taught her never to show fear. Taking a deep breath, she turned her head slowly to face him, and, as she looked up, her hair fell back from her face. Lou Kopp’s face registered woozy confusion, then shock as his smile slipped.

“What the hell—”

Charlotte winced but willed her voice to remain even.

“My name is Charlotte Godowski. You might remember who I am. I’m an accountant in your company.”

Now the voices from the bar turned to hoots of laughter. “Wow! Tonight’s your lucky night.” “Hey, this is Christmas, not Halloween!”

After each outburst they broke into a renewed round of drunken laughter that riddled like bullets.

Charlotte’s defense was to pretend not to hear them, or the sympathetic tsks from the women within hearing distance. Yet inside she felt like a slip of paper that had burned, curled and turned to ash. If only she could blow away.

For Charlotte knew, as she saw Lou Kopp swagger back to the bar to be welcomed with sympathetic slaps on the back, that tonight would be no different from all the other parties she had ever attended. No different from the lunchrooms at school. Now the naughty boys had a target upon which to vent their frustration against all the beautiful girls who’d scorned them.

Charlotte stood straight and filed past the boozy comrades at the bar. They drunkenly nudged and snickered as she crossed their line of vision. Judy Riker hurried to meet her at the door.

“Charlotte, I don’t know what to say. Maybe if—”

“Please,” she responded, holding up her hand. “Merry Christmas, Judy. Good night.”

It just wasn’t in her to muster a smile. Turning on her heel, she quickly collected her coat, covered the now despised red wool dress, then pressed the elevator button. The bell rang promptly and she moved quickly into the box, punching the lobby button, then closing her eyes in relief at being alone. Just as the doors swept shut, however, a man hurried in. The door bounced from his shoulders then quickly slid shut behind him.

Looking up, she saw Lou Kopp.

“Going to the garage?” Lou asked, pushing the G button.

Charlotte didn’t respond. Silently, she began praying. Hail Mary, full of grace…

“Listen. About what happened earlier…”

Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb…

“I’m sorry.”

Her prayer halted. Did he say he was sorry?

“Hey, it was a terrible thing we did in there. Some of the guys were drunk. Not that that’s any excuse,” he hurried to amend. “And, as your boss, I take full responsibility. Please, Miss Goz…Well. Accept my apology.”

Charlotte hesitated, looking up to gauge the expression in his eyes. Lou Kopp wasn’t a good looking man by most standards. Slick was the word that best described him. His eyes were his saving grace. They were a sunny sky blue that brightened when he smiled, as he did now. You’re the last person who should judge a person by looks, she scolded herself. She accepted his apology with a brief nod.

“How can I make it up to you?”

“You’ve said you’re sorry,” she replied. “That’s enough.”

“No, it’s not. How about I buy you a drink? Wanna go for a drink?”

“No. Thank you.”

“How’re you getting home?”

“I’ll take a cab. It’s not far.” She was planning on taking the train.

“You’ll never get a cab. It’s the holidays—a Friday night. No way. Hey, I’ll tell you what. I’ll drive you home. What d’ya say? It’s the least I can do.”

“That’s not necessary,” she replied, almost stammering.

“Sure it is. I’ll drive you home. It’s no big deal. Besides,” he added, “I’m your boss. I should take care of my employees, right?”

She didn’t have time to respond. The elevator doors opened on the fourth floor and a tall man, conservatively dressed in a long navy wool coat, stepped inside. The elevator seemed to shrink in size and Charlotte, mesmerized, grew acutely aware of everything about him. She stole a quick glance.

He had the most beautiful skin, she thought. The rich color of terra cotta. His cheekbones were high and pronounced, and he had a strong Mayan nose that gave him a distinguished, even stern appearance. Although his thick black hair was fringed along his starched white collar, it was so neatly cut that it was clear the length was by choice, not neglect. Most arresting of all, he bore the indefinable manner of a gentleman, which always set a woman at ease, knowing she had nothing to fear. The scent of sandalwood cut through the stale air of the small compartment.

As they descended, he stood with his dark, long, unadorned fingers clasped before him. In contrast, Lou fingered coins in his pocket. When they reached the lobby and the doors slid open again, the tall man stepped forward and paused to hold the door for her in an age-old gesture of chivalry. Charlotte, flattered, moved forward. Suddenly she felt Lou Kopp’s hand on her arm. She paused awkwardly. The stranger’s dark eyes flashed to meet Charlotte’s, then flicked to Lou’s hand on her arm before quickly snapping back to her, his brows knitted in question.

“Did you want to get out?” he asked. His voice was low and polite, yet she heard in the undercurrent the clear indication that he would help her if she needed it.

“I said I’ll drive you home.” Lou’s voice sounded insistent, and she felt his grip tighten on her arm. He was her boss and Charlotte responded instantly to the authority in his voice.

“Thank you,” she said to the stranger. “I’m fine.”

The man’s gaze probed like an eagle’s, then without another word, he nodded politely and stepped aside, allowing the doors to hum shut between them.

“Lousy spic,” muttered Lou. “What did he think he was doing?”

Being a gentleman, Charlotte thought to herself as she dropped her gaze to her shoes. She felt suddenly and inexplicably lonely.

Lou Kopp and Charlotte rode down the one floor to the garage in silence. Neither did they speak as she followed him along the freezing ramp of the dimly lit, deserted garage. The cement walls were dingy and smeared with graffiti, and the frigid air was heavy with the acrid smell of gasoline. At last they reached a large gray Oldsmobile parked in the corner. He opened the doors and slid into the front seat. Charlotte followed suit.

Lou fired the engine but it coughed, chugged and stalled in the bitter cold. “Damn, but it’s cold. Can’t barely touch the metal.”

Charlotte didn’t respond but curled her chilled toes in her shoes.

Finally the engine turned over, sputtering unevenly and rocking the car like an old beast of burden roused from its hibernation. “Good ol’ American car,” Lou said with a gleam of triumph while rubbing his hands vigorously. Long streams of vapor flowed from his lips and the scent of stale brandy hung heavily in the air. Charlotte ducked her nose into her collar and tucked her icy fingers under her arms. Tonight was one of those arctic Chicago nights that froze the hair in one’s nostrils.

“Yep. Cold tonight,” he repeated, glancing her way with a spark in his eyes. “Wind chill brings it below zero.”

“Feels like it,” she responded shyly, shivering in the darkness. The lights from the garage were dim and made their skin appear sallow and gaunt. “Maybe we should wait inside till the engine warms up.”