Into the Fire (5 page)

He parked near her car, and was up the stairs and…

Han opened the door before he rang the bell—she must’ve been watching for him.

“I’m so sorry about your dad,” she said, then, God, she was in his arms—a curious mix of softness and strength. “I wanted to come, but I couldn’t get the time off and—”

“I know. It’s okay,” Murphy told her, closing his eyes as he breathed in the familiar scent of her laundry detergent or shampoo or whatever it was that made Hannah always smell so good—so clean and fresh. “He’s been gone a long time, so…It was okay, Han.”

“I should have been there,” she insisted, holding him even more tightly.

He smelled her before he saw her—Angelina—a whiff of exotic perfume in the air or maybe on Hannah, from an earlier embrace. He opened his eyes, still hugging Han, and there she was, lingering in the doorway to Hannah’s little living room.

Angelina Esparza, of whom Hannah had so often spoken. Han’s best friend for going on eight years now.

Murph’s heart didn’t stop, and choirs of angels didn’t break into heavenly song.

Yeah, the woman was unbelievably gorgeous—dark to Hannah’s pale; long, thick, straight dark hair to Han’s boyishly short waves. She was curvier than Hannah, too. More buxom, and unafraid to wear formfitting tops with low-cut necklines that featured her extremely,
extremely
impressive cleavage.

Unlike Hannah, she wore jewelry—large hoop earrings, a necklace, bangles on her wrists—and makeup. Not a lot. Just enough to tweak her naturally beautiful features into something truly amazing.

She was watching him as he hugged Hannah, and as their gazes met, she smiled. “You must be the one and only Murphy.”

“Which makes you the one and only Angelina.”

Her smile broadened. “I guess you’ve heard a lot about me, too.”

Hannah pulled back to look at him, and under the force of her scrutiny, Murph turned his attention back to her.

She was more upset about missing his father’s funeral than he’d been about the fact that his father had finally needed a funeral—which seemed wrong. And, of course, being Han, she knew exactly what he was thinking.

“It’s okay, Vinh,” she said. “That you’re all right. It’s okay if you’re not…Whatever you’re feeling is absolutely okay.”

“It was a relief,” he admitted. Man, that sounded awful. He glanced back at Angelina. “My father had Alzheimer’s.”

“I know,” she said quietly. “Hannah told me. I’m so sorry for your loss.”

He’d grieved and mourned for the seemingly endless years it had taken the disease to finally steal the part of his father’s mind that kept him alive. For most of that time, the old man had had absolutely no idea who Murphy was—his only son. His only child.

Murphy had shared his pain with Hannah, leaning on her more than once through these last few awful years, spending his summers crewing on her uncle Patrick’s whale-watching boat in the icy waters of Alaska’s Inside Passage.

“It’s okay to feel relieved,” Hannah told him now, her eyes filled with her compassion and sympathy, “that he’s finally at peace.”

“Yeah,” Murphy said, ruffling her hair. “I know. It’s just…”

“Weird,” she said, understanding. “That he finally gets a eulogy. After all this time…”

Murph had told her years ago that it didn’t seem fair. His father was gone. His body still moved and needed care, but the man inside wasn’t ever coming back. Yet none of his friends had the chance to gather together and remember a life well lived.

At Hannah’s urging, he’d written about his father and e-mailed it to all of the old man’s Marine buddies. He’d even sent his little essay to family—relatives who still kept their distance because they hadn’t approved of Malcolm Murphy’s Vietnamese wife.

Most of them didn’t respond, although his cousin Nola had reached out to him. “Nola and Ricco were at the funeral,” he told Hannah now.

She squeezed his hand. “I’m glad. How are they?”

“Good,” he said. “They’re good. It was…It was nice to see them.” He turned to Angelina, because it was time to shake off this too-somber mood he’d brought into Han’s apartment with him. “Angelina. I was starting to think you were a figment of Han’s crazed imagination.”

“Sometimes I think I might be,” she said with a smile. It was hard to believe she was only Hannah’s age—what were they? Just a year out of college. Little Hannah. Sweet, young Hannah, Patrick’s niece—as Murph had trained himself to think of her.

She’d gotten a job as a uniformed beat cop with the Fresno police department—why she hadn’t applied for a position up in Juneau, he couldn’t figure out. Of course, Angelina was in LA, and these days Murph floated between San Diego and Sacramento.

“Vinh Murphy, Angelina Esparza,” Hannah went through the formality. “About time you two met.” She turned to Murphy. “You missed dinner. I’m sorry we didn’t wait—”

“Don’t worry,” he said. “
I’m
sorry. Traffic around the airport—”

“It’s okay,” she said. “You’re forgiven. Funeral. Free pass. But if you need food, bwee, you’ll have to forage for leftovers in the fridge. Don’t you dare drink all the beer before I get back. I gotta grab my bag.”

“What?” Murphy said. “Where…?”

“She’s got an extra shift,” Angelina explained as Hannah vanished into her bedroom. “It’s a rookie thing.”

“Diaz called in sick,” Hannah called from the other room. “And it’s not a full shift, just a special assignment. Traffic control after a high school basketball game. I’ll be back in a few hours, unless the losing team does something stupid.” She came back down the hall, duffle in her hand. “Angel, show him where the leftovers are, will you?” She stopped in front of Murphy. “Sorry to have to run out on you like this.”

“Go,” he said. “I’ll be fine. Angelina can tell me her side of all the stories you’ve told me about her through the years.” He turned to Angelina. “Whose idea was it, really? To put Metamucil into that mean girl’s lemonade on the night of the cookout with the boys’ camp? What was her name? Brianna something.”

“Brianna Parker, the bitch,” Hannah and Angelina unisoned, then laughed.

“That was me,” Angelina volunteered. “We both had a crush on the same lifeguard. Bobby Contini. I actually thought I had a chance with him.”

“You were, after all,” Hannah said, “the daughter of the famous BadAss T.” Laughing, she shouldered her bag. “I gotta go.”

“We’ll be here,” Angelina said and Hannah shut the door behind her.

And there they were. Still standing in Han’s little foyer.

“So,” Angelina said. “Let’s get you some dinner.” She led the way into the kitchen—as if he needed a tour guide—and started getting out a plate and utensils.

“I can do it,” Murphy said, opening the refrigerator. “You don’t need to. I know where everything is.”

“You must visit Hannah a lot.” She leaned back against the counter.

“I travel a lot,” Murphy told her as he pried open the lid of what looked like some truly excellent meatloaf. “So, yeah. I usually crash on her couch every few weeks or so.”

“Très diplomatique.” Angelina gave him a golf clap. “Answering my unspoken question—are you sleeping with her—with such tact and grace.”

He laughed as he added some mashed potatoes and green beans to his plate. “We’re just friends,” he said. He put the plate into the microwave and dialed up a few minutes of heat before turning back to Angelina. “Didn’t Han tell you that?”

“She did, but…She has her secrets,” Angelina told him. “I was just wondering if you were one of them.”

“She thinks of me like a big brother,” he said.

“And when you’re crashed on her couch,” Angelina asked, “you never lie awake thinking…maybe you’d be more comfortable in her bed?”

“Never,” Murphy cheerfully lied.

“Do you actually
fit
on the couch?”

“Trust me,” he said. “I’m a Marine. I can sleep anywhere.”

“Do you have a girlfriend?” Angelina asked.

“Negative,” Murphy said as the microwave beeped.

“Boyfriend?”

He shot her a look. “Ditto.” He took his plate out, burning his fingers and letting it rattle onto the counter. “Ow!”

Angelina turned on the sink faucet, and he put both hands under the cold water. “You wanna hook up?”

“Come again?” Murphy turned off the water, turned to look at her.

“Hook up,” she repeated. “It’s what we younguns say when we want to have hot monkey sex.”

He laughed. She was too funny. “I know what hook up means, little girl.”

“It was kind of a yes/no question,” Angelina pointed out, obviously trying hard not to smile back at him. “Big man.”

“No,” he said. “Thank you. But, no.”

He pushed his plate over to the breakfast counter, where Hannah had a pair of bar stools. He slid onto one, but Angelina didn’t move—she just leaned against the counter, her smile slipping free as she watched him. Hot damn, she was beyond gorgeous.
Hot monkey sex…

“Hannah told me you…sometimes say outrageous things,” Murphy told her.

Her smile broadened, and her perfect white teeth flashed as her eyes sparkled. “Oh, come on.
That
wasn’t particularly outrageous. It
is
the twenty-first century. Women
are
allowed to make the first move.”

The meatloaf tasted even better than it smelled. “What would you have done if I’d’ve said yes?”

“Total win/win situation here,” she said. “You say no, I find out you really are this pillar of honor that Han made you out to be. You say yes, I get to have sex with a guy I’ve pretty much wanted to do since Hannah first described him.”

Murphy laughed. “Right.”

She laughed, too. “I’m serious.”

He got up, took a beer out of the fridge. “Hannah said you rarely were. You know, serious.”

“Hannah said the very same thing about you, hot stuff,” Angelina countered. She didn’t back away as he opened the bottle and tossed the cap into the garbage. She smelled incredibly good.

“She also said I’d probably fall in love with you at first sight.” He took a slug as he went back to his seat.

“How’s that going?” she asked.

He shook his head in mock dismay. “Sadly, she was wrong.”

“Most guys need to see me naked,” Angelina pointed out. “She probably meant you’d fall in love with me at the first sight of me naked. With that in mind, the offer of hot monkey sex stands.” She glanced at her watch. “For the next…ten minutes.”

“Ten minutes,” he said on a laugh. “Does that include the actual
having
of the hot monkey sex, or is that just my window of opportunity to change my mind?”

“One would hope,” she said sternly, “that true hot monkey sex would take the better part of an hour.”

Murphy laughed again. “While I appreciate the repeated offer, I don’t need to see you naked,” he said. “The reason I didn’t fall in love with you at first sight is because I’ve been in love with you for, wow, it must be four years now. Pretty much since Hannah told me about you. The magnificent Angelina.” He toasted her with his beer. “Even more magnificent in the flesh.”

“And yet,” she pointed out, “you say no to hot monkey sex.”

“It’s a pure and chaste kind of love,” he told her, digging in to the potatoes.

“Spoken like a true pillar of honor.”

“Assuming pillars can speak.”

Angelina slid onto the stool next to him. “I know you were…only joking, but…” Up close, her eyes were almost unbearably dark brown—the kind of eyes into which a man could lose himself forever. She was speaking softly, practically whispering and he found himself leaning closer. “That’s exactly what it feels like. Like I’ve known you forever and…Like I’ve loved you for even longer. I’m going to marry you, Vinh.” She reached up and touched him, her fingers cool on the back of his neck. “I’ve been waiting for you, all my life.”

She was serious. Everything up to this point had been flirtatious, outrageous fun. But now she was serious, and, with his heart beating double-time, Murphy didn’t feel the need to mock her about the fact that
all her life
was a mere twenty-three years. She was
serious,
and she leaned in and kissed him and—

Murphy awoke with a start and for a moment, he didn’t know where he was.

A cabin.

He was on the hard wooden floor of a cabin. Weak morning light filtered in through a window, illuminating the rustic beams that supported the roof. He could see the stone chimney of a fireplace. The light from that window reflected on the gleaming glass of a gun case, keys in its lock.

It was Patrick’s cabin—although Murphy wasn’t sure if he was in Dalton or Juneau.

What he
did
know was that he wasn’t alone. Angelina was nestled, warm and solid against him, curled up tightly. They must’ve had too much to drink. She would laugh when he told her he’d dreamed, so vividly, about the night they’d met, about their first kiss—so sweet and hot and…

Angelina stirred. “Murph?”

But it wasn’t Angelina, it was Hannah and…

No. God,
no
.

But try as he might to stay here in this place where Angelina could well be in the next room, his memories of the past few years came crashing down around him.