The Pearl Diver (35 page)

Here’s a sneak preview of

The Typhoon Lover

by
Sujata Massey

Available in October 2005
in hardcover from
HarperCollins Publishers

I’ve never thought of myself as the blindfold type.

Not on planes, not in beds, and certainly not in restaurants. Especially not a place like DC Coast, where I was sitting on the evening of my thirtieth birthday, listening to my dinner companion trying his best to be persuasive.

“What happens next will be very special,” Hugh said, picking up the small black mask that he’d placed next to our shared dessert. “You don’t have to put the blindfold on inside here. Just a little later.”

“You promised no party,” I reminded him, but not sharply. My stomach was filled with a pleasant mélange of tuna tartare and crawfish risotto and crispy fried bass. It had been an orgy of seafood and good wine, just my kind of night.

“Hmm,” Hugh said, studying the restaurant bill.

“If it’s not a surprise party, where are you taking me?” I prodded.

“Let’s just say I’ve got two tickets to paradise.”

I rolled my eyes, thinking Hugh was showing his age, when I’d rather keep mine confidential. I didn’t mind having a delicious, leisurely dinner, but he’d practically rushed me through cappuc
cino and crème brûlée. Hugh was frantic to leave, which made me think he definitely had something planned.

As we waited for the car to be brought to us on the busy corner of 14th and K Streets, Hugh folded the tiny black blindfold into my hand. “It’s never been used, if that makes you more comfortable. I saved it from my last trip to Zurich.”

“I thought you didn’t believe in regifting?” I asked lightly.

“Well, you didn’t want a ring. What else can I offer you?” The undercurrent of irritation in Hugh’s voice was clear. I’d worn his beautiful, two-carat emerald for a short while, but ultimately returned it, because engagement rings scared me just as much as turning thirty did. Hugh was thirty-two; he’d been ready for the last three years. I wondered if I’d ever be.

The valet pulled up with the car and jumped out to open the passenger side for me. I got in, feeling a mixture of excitement and fear about what lay ahead. As we pulled off into traffic, I reclined my seat as far as it would go, hoping that this way, nobody would notice the girl with short black hair and a matching mask over her eyes. If anyone caught a glimpse, they might think I’d just come out of plastic surgery or something like that—though most Washington women who went in for that flew to Latin America, where the plastic surgeons were good and there were no neighbors to bump into.

“Are we headed for the airport?” I asked, with a sudden rush of hope.

“No chance.” Hugh sounded regretful. “It would have been fun to get away, but I can’t risk any absences when the partner track decisions are forthcoming.”

Hugh was a lawyer at a high-pressure international firm a few blocks away. He’d been working for the last year on a class-action suit that still wasn’t ready to roll. His work involved frequent travel back to Japan, the country of my heritage, where we’d met a few years earlier. I would have loved to travel with him, but couldn’t because I was banned from Japan. It was a complicated story I didn’t want to revisit on a night that I was supposed to be happy.

“Don’t think about it,” I muttered to myself. It was my habit to talk to myself sometimes, to try to shut out the bad thoughts that threatened what was a perfectly pleasant life.

“What don’t you want to think about?”

“I’m getting nauseated from wearing a blindfold in a moving car,” I said. “Not to mention, my nerves are shot because you won’t tell me what’s going to happen next.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Just hang on, I’ll open the window.” Hugh pressed the control that slid down the passenger-side window next to me. “We’re just going around the corner to park. Will you survive another two minutes?”

I nodded, glad for a chance to listen to the sounds of the road. I could tell this wasn’t our neighborhood of Adams-Morgan, with its mix of pulsating salsa music, honking horns, and shouting truck drivers. All I heard was a slow, steady purr of cars caught in traffic. After a while, the car moved again and turned a corner. Then it stopped. Hugh’s window slid down.

“Paradise, sir?” a strange man’s voice asked.

“That’s right. We’re staying till the wee morning hours,” Hugh said. “Will this cover it?”

Before the parking valet could answer, I had a few words of my own. “Hugh, you
know
that I have a nine-thirty meeting at the Sackler Gallery tomorrow. You can very well stay until the wee hours, but I can’t.”

“Job interviews come and go. Thirtieth birthdays are only once!” He sounded positively gleeful.

My door was opened, and I unbuckled my seat belt. Then I felt a hand on my wrist, helping me out.

“You must be the girl getting the big birthday surprise.” The valet’s voice came from somewhere to the left.

I was busy working through the situation—was this a boutique hotel, maybe?—when Hugh tugged my hand. “There’s going to be a downward flight of steps in a moment. Just take it slowly.”

“What kind of a hotel has subterranean rooms?” I demanded.

“You’ll know soon enough.” Ten steps, and then a flat surface. “I’m going to hold the door open. Just step through.”

I had no sight, but my other senses were bombarded. First, the sounds—a Dead Can Dance song pounding ominously on a stereo, and lots of voices—talking, laughing, shrieking. Then there were the smells—smoke from cigarettes and sandalwood incense.

Someone took my other hand and pressed briefly down on the area over my knuckles. I guessed that I was getting a hand-stamp, like what bouncers give at bars.

“Hugh, this is so silly,” I complained. “I want to see where I am. If this is the S and M club we read about in
City Paper
I’m not going any farther.”

Hugh sighed and said, “I’d hoped you’d stay blindfolded until the magic moment, but if you’re that anxious, you may as well take it off. Go ahead.”

Had I known about the series of events about to unfold—not that night, perhaps, but in the crazy, dangerous days that rolled out, right after my birthday—I might have just kept on the blindfold. I would have remained in Hugh’s thrall, powerless to make my own choices, but secure—still twenty-nine and safe as houses.

But I’m not the kind of girl who stays in one place for long, whether it’s a house or a nightclub vestibule.

I slid off the blindfold, and opened my eyes.

From the very beginning, when I was casting about for an idea for Rei’s new adventure, my editor, Carolyn Marino, was inspirational. So, too, were longtime readers and e-mail friends, especially Reiko Okochi in Palos Verdes, Paul Sayles in San Francisco, and Ryohei Omori in Tokyo. I thank Gerard Busnuk for patiently answering my questions about American police procedure, and John Mann for his lessons on American warfare in Vietnam. I am indebted to the U.S. Marine Corps Historical Center, especially Frederick J. Graboske, head of the archives section, and Robert V. Aquilina, historian and assistant head of the reference section. Karen Oertel, a coowner of the Harris seafood business and Harrison’s Restaurant in Grasonville, taught me all I know about Chesapeake Bay history and oysters. Julie Kehrli, chief of staff for the Honorable Senator Paul S. Sarbanes, D-Maryland, was kind enough to give me an office tour and teach me about the ins and outs of Senate life.

So many restaurants filled me with delicious food and ideas. I am especially grateful to the staff of the former Aquavit restaurant in Minneapolis, and in Washington, D.C., to restaurants including Burma, DC Coast, Poste, Zola, and Zaytinya. I also give special thanks to my husband, Tony, who manfully submitted to many
restaurant dinners over the past year, and to Carina Casabón Inzunza, for giving our children dinner and a lot of fun during these times. I owe the writing of this book to Larry Horwitz and all staffers and friends, past and present, at the real Urban Grounds in Baltimore, as well as Mike Sproge and Glen Breining at its reincarnation The Evergreen. Without your encouragement, nickels for the meter, and single skim-milk lattes, this book would not have progressed past page one. Finally, to my children, Pia and Neel: You’re the best—now eat your asparagus!

Sujata Massey

October 2003

Baltimore, Maryland

Cover design by Peter Martin

Cover photographs: woman’s feet © by

Lesley Robson-Foster/Getty Images; oyster shell

© by Steve Cohen/Foodpix/Getty Images