Chapter Two #3
to Quinn in his native tongue. Quinn responded, a rush of words flying over Meggie’s and Jill’s heads.
“I think he just told him we want to use forks and spoons,” Meggie whispered. For the first time since leaving the apartment
building, Jill smiled.
“See what I mean,” Jill whispered back. “My dad knows just about everything.”
“I sincerely doubt that,” Quinn inserted drily, lifting his menu. “I recommend the seafood. Ananda suggested the duck, but
that may be a bit exotic for you girls.”
Meggie winked at Jill. “I’m in the mood for exotic, how about you?”
Jill looked up, her eyes peering just above the menu. “I was thinking about ordering a hamburger.”
“Hamburger?” Meggie pretended acute shock. “Where’s your sense of adventure, girl?”
“Well . . .” She looked to her father, her eyes seeking his advice.
In that second, as brief as it was, Meggie saw such undisguised adoration it nearly knocked the oxygen from her lungs. Jill
may have been just thirteen, but it wouldn’t have mattered if she was twenty-three. This child desperately needed her father’s
approval.
“Don’t look at me,” Quinn told his daughter curtly. “The decision is yours. You can have anything you want.”
Meggie clenched her hands in her lap, her long fingernails biting into the palms of her hands. Round eyes urgently pleaded
with him to see what he was doing to Jill.
Jill’s downcast eyes continued to study the menu. “I guess I’ll try the Gulf of Siam seafood dish. That sounds exotic, doesn’t
it, Meggie?”
Meggie laughed aloud. “That’s more than exotic, my dear. I’d term that brave.”
Quinn gave the order and a few minutes later Ananda returned, laying out several small bowls of sauces, some hot and spicy,
others less so. In painstaking English he explained each sauce.
The duck smelled of curry and ginger and was layered on a bed of stir-fried vegetables. Jill’s dinner was a combination of
several varieties of seafood with vegetables and rice.
“Meggie likes to pray before she eats,” Jill announced after the waiter had departed. An uncomfortable silence followed as
Quinn stopped to study Meggie. A disconcerting, wary light crept into his brown eyes.
Meggie hadn’t intended to make an issue of prayer; she would gladly have followed their lead but Jill had brought up the subject.
“Why do you pray before eating?” Jill questioned after a while. It was asked with genuine curiosity, without censure or ridicule.
“It’s a way of saying thank you to God for supplying my needs,” Meggie explained.
“Your needs?” The soft inflection in her voice made the statement a question.
“My dinner, and my friends.” She faltered slightly over the word “friends.” Meggie suddenly felt as if Quinn and Jill had
pinned her to a specimen plate, and were examining her and her beliefs under a microscope. Meggie wasn’t accustomed to defending
herself and stiffened.
Quinn shrugged. “A little religion never hurt anyone. It wouldn’t do you any harm to start attending Sunday school, Jill.”
The young girl bristled defiantly. “You aren’t getting me into one of those crazy places.”
Meggie couldn’t restrain the soft laughter. “Honestly, you two make faith sound like some kind of disease. And Jill, you’re
acting like church is worse than going to the dentist.”
“I’d rather visit the dentist,” Jill shot back aggressively. “Have you ever seen the kind of people who attend church?”
Meggie burst out laughing. “All the time! You know if you two would put aside your prejudices long enough you might discover
that Christians are plain, ordinary, everyday people.”
“You mean besides being pious, judgmental and all-around ‘dudley-do-rights’?” Quinn teased, but there was an underlying tone
of seriousness.
Supporting her elbows on the linen tablecloth, Meggie looked Quinn directly in the eyes. “Shall I tell you some of the gossip
floating around about the Portland Police Department?”
“Touché, O’Halloran, touché.”
After dinner Quinn and Jill persuaded Meggie to try her hand at bowling. It had been years since Meggie had lifted a bowling
ball. As she suspected, Quinn was an excellent bowler and Meggie wondered fleetingly if there was anything this man couldn’t
do. Jill and Meggie played so terribly that more balls landed in the gutter than hit the pins. Finally the two women decided
the only way they could compete against Quinn was to combine their scores. Still, he won the match.
An hour later Meggie and Quinn sat in her kitchen while Jill watched her favorite television show. Meggie unplugged the perking
coffee pot as Quinn studied her agile movements around the kitchen.
“Jill likes you,” he commented easily, his voice slightly husky.
Meggie set two mugs down on the countertop. “I like her, too. She’s a beautiful girl.” Immediately Meggie knew she’d said
the wrong thing. Quinn’s mouth twisted and a tight mask descended over his face.
His look went right past Meggie, centered on the bright yellow wall behind her. “Jill’s mother was very beautiful.”
“She must have been,” Meggie whispered, watching the younger girl from her position in the kitchen. Jill was a beautiful child.
Long, naturally blonde hair, a face that was almost angelic and big, blue eyes that were sure to tempt any man’s heart. Except
perhaps the one that mattered to her most—her father’s.
Quinn’s hands hugged the cup after she placed the steaming mug on the table, his look absent. “Jill needs a friend.”
“So do I,” Meggie admitted. “It doesn’t seem that long ago that I was suddenly facing life without my mother, learning to
deal with my own grief and searching to find the ‘real’ me—all within the space of a few months.”
“You turned out all right.” A peculiar look flashed across his face.
Meggie laughed, amused. “Thanks, I’ll let my dad know you think so.”
Lying in bed, unable to sleep later, Meggie mused over the evening with Quinn and Jill. There was a void, a hurt in each of
their lives. Perhaps God had sent her to Portland to help this small family, to show them His love. It was a task that boggled
the mind. Meggie lay awake, staring at the ceiling, praying for this man who attracted her and his daughter who reminded her
so much of herself.
The telephone startled her. Quickly she glanced at the clock. It was almost midnight. Tossing back the covers, Meggie reached
for her robe at the foot of the bed, her heart hammering in her ears. Slowly she walked into the living room.
Three rings.
Please God, she prayed, don’t let it be him. Not again. The whistle remained by the telephone and she picked it up at the
same time as she did the receiver.
“Hello,” she whispered, her voice trembling.
A piercing shrill burst from the other end of the line. The noise jolted her and she dropped the phone.
Even with her hand placed protectively over her ear, she could hear the muffled voice coming out of the receiver lying on
the carpet.
“Don’t blow a whistle in my ear again, Meggie. You’ll pay, you’ll pay.”