Chapter Thirty One:

Saturday, November 1, 1997 – California – somewhere on I-5

Sometimes, the universe can be a real bitch. How could so much have happened in the span of three days?

Forty Eight hours or so ago, she had answered the door and found Enos there, trying to explain about why he had not called her after the accident.

By that time, being angry with him was the farthest thing from her mind. She had flung herself at him before he knew what was happening. Feeling the tears falling on his neck, he held her and tried to apologize for making her cry.

"Soonie," he'd said, in his gentle, soothing Georgia voice, "I'm so sorry. Please don't cry."

"I was only angry at you because I had to hear it on the news. I should not have yelled at you in Korean."

"If you were gonna' do it in another language, you should have bawled me out in Spanish so I could understand it. 'Cept, I don't think Thompson would have gotten as much of a charge out of it if you had." He smiled, pulling her away only slightly to see her face.

That had made her smile in spite of herself. Then, her smile had disappeared as quickly. "That is not why I am upset."

"Then, what?" he asked. Her nose was red, as if she had been crying for a while. "Soonie, what's wrong?"

"It is my brother," she said. "His plane disappeared on its way back from Zaire. They are pretty certain it crashed."

"Shot down?"

"They do not know. There is so much turmoil in the region. I got a call from Uncle Sang-jun about an hour ago. The NGO Jae-sung's team was working with is trying to gain access to Zaire and he was with them."

"But he's not a diplomat, he's a doctor. I thought he was workin' at the clinic in Rwanda. Why would he be with…?"

"I do not know. I only know that he was on the plane. They lost contact with the pilot sometime yesterday morning. Uncle said it could take several days to find out where it might have gone down. The best we can hope for is that it was forced down and he is a prisoner somewhere. But," she hesitated, "I do not think that would be a good thing either."

"What about his little girl? Where is Gem?"

"With my father. You know the situation between my father and myself - I have not talked to him. But Uncle says she does not know yet." With that, Soonie, exhaustion evident in her breathing, buried her head in his chest and sniffled into his shirt. "She is only four years old."

Without a word, he had guided her to the sofa and gathered her into his arms, where she always felt warm and safe; like she could curl up into a ball and live there for the rest of her life. She had gone to sleep there. Wednesday night and Thursday morning had left little doubt in her mind, and heart, that he loved her.

But he was a man of honor and, technically, he felt as if he was still engaged to Daisy Duke. That would make no sense to someone else, but it was part of the reason she loved him. It was the reason she had turned the car around and headed back to Los Angeles.

At 9:15 p.m., while at the Halloween charity ball with Enos, Soonie had received the call from her uncle that she had dreaded for two days.

At 2:30 a.m. Soonie was driving her Audi north on Interstate 5, headed for her uncle's house in San Francisco and listening to an Alison Krauss CD. It was the one she had traded Enos for her John Williams CD. By 2:45 a.m., when Alison was halfway through When You Say Nothin' At All, she used the exit at Santa Clarita and headed back south toward L.A.

The countryside was eerie with no moon and only the mile markers in the headlights for company. The Verdugos, and the future she had hoped for, were invisible in the blackness. By the time she passed Burbank, the anger at what had transpired a few hours earlier had transformed into the fear that she might lose Enos to the very thing that had made her fall utterly, completely and hopelessly in love with him.

She had been so proud of herself for keeping it together; for being so civilized about the whole thing. What she had really wanted to do was slap him until he came to his senses and realized that he was in love with her, not Daisy, and that no sense of loyalty or pre-commitment he felt he had to Daisy would ever change that.

He just hadn't been able to tell Daisy about them and end it over the phone. Soonie understood that. She had even felt some weird affinity for Daisy, if for nothing else but the fact that Enos had loved her. He was not the type of man to give his love to just anyone. But, from her perspective, his love for Daisy was a different kind of love.

The woman was a major part of his history. They were finally speaking again. Oddly, she credited the re-establishment of contact between them for having paved the way for hers and Enos' relationship to grow.

Enos had promised he would tell Daisy, in person, at Thanksgiving, about her. That was the plan. So, why had Daisy shown up, without any warning, last night?

Soonie calmly, more calmly than she ever imagined she could be, had said, "Te quiero. Llámame cuando lo hayas resuelto," and left him with the one person in the universe that could change the future she so desperately wanted.

When she reached the east edge of Griffith Park, she got another phone call. This time it was from Detective Gordon Thompson.

A/N: Translation for "Te quiero. Llámame cuando lo hayas resuelto." - "I love you. Call me when you have sorted it out."