Agent out of Time (The Agents for Good) Read online

  Trent’s gaze was judging, as he weighed her sincerity of statement, “And why is that?”

  Her eyes drifted down him admiringly and her response was a simple raising of the eyebrows.

  “Is that all you look at in a relationship?” Trent asked sarcastically.

  “I’ve never known there to be much of anything else worth going for.” Deshavi responded defensively.

  His hand closed around the back of her knee and he tugged her off the edge of the bank she’d been sitting on. She landed hard in the ditch on her backside. Breathing heavy, as a result of the unexpected movement on his part she pressed back against her side of the ditch away from him, completely unsure of his motives all of a sudden. She actually felt threatened.

  The ditch was too narrow to avoid him, when he reached out and pulled her to her feet. He took her hands before she could object and folded them around the handle of a shovel.

  His eyes met hers and she relaxed a little when she saw a glint of humor in the depths of his, “Someone very wise once told me that the only relationships worth having were those that went deeper than just the surface of the skin and that to get those relationships in place, hard work is required to both build and maintain them. Perhaps you’re past failures with relationships were because you didn’t work hard enough at them.”

  He stepped away and moved down the ditch from Deshavi and grabbed up another shovel along the way.

  She stared incredulously after him, “You’re expecting me to dig in the dirt in order to be with you?”

  He didn’t answer and she looked around, as she grappled with what to do. This was crazy! She stared at the shovel in her hands.

  “You can’t ask me to dig up the remains of my relatives, let alone evidence that they might not of been the first ones on this continent!”

  Trent straightened up and turned around to face her, “Hey I didn’t make you sign anything to be here. If you want to go, then go.”

  He turned back around to his work. Deshavi glared spitefully at his back for a moment. Her gaze shifted to the shovel handle in her hands. Thirteen and a half million was beginning to look like too little of a reward for putting up with this man! Muttering darkly to herself she turned to the loose dirt on her side of the ditch and began to throw it out with the shovel.

  “You know if you put less effort into talking and more effort into your work, then more would get done.”

  Deshavi straightened and turned around to face Trent.

  Her gaze was suspicious as she asked, “Have you been talking with my grandfather?”

  “Why do you ask that?”

  “Because you’re beginning to sound a lot like him!” She turned back to the loose dirt before her and attacked it with a vengeance.

  Ted guffawed and took another swig of his beer.

  “You old rascal! Caleb I swear you only get more intriguing with age.”

  I shrugged, but I couldn’t erase the proud smile off of my face at my accomplishment. I picked up my pair of binoculars and gazed again up close at the pair of individuals hard at work at the dig site. Deshavi was beginning to noticeably drag. Poor girl, I thought, without really meaning it. Trent was accomplishing something I hadn’t in years, which was to get Deshavi to perform honest labor.

  She must really want the money to put herself through this torture. Something had happened, I mused to myself. I didn’t know what it was, but it had scared her enough to embark on this venture with all her effort.

  Ted commented from where he viewed the pair through his binoculars, “So since her most obvious weapon is off the table, how do you think she’ll snare him?”

  “Not sure. I’d say we’re looking at her best strategy, the classic ‘companionship best buddy couldn’t do without me don’t you want to experience more with me’, approach.”

  Ted sub commented, “A brutally effective strategy, if I do say so myself.”

  “Think he’ll fall for it?” I asked.

  “Oh from the way he’s soaking up the sight of her, when she’s not looking, I’d say he wants the prize as bad as anyone ever did. He’ll fall for it, but it will be a well thought out and managed surrender, instead of a complete route on his part.”

  I put my binoculars down and studied Ted, “Ted it’s not too late! I can ship Deshavi out of here and your grandson can remain free from heartbreak.”

  Ted glanced over at me, “Don’t you dare! Your granddaughter may be many things, but somewhere in her runs the blood of one of the best men I have ever known and that I have been fortune enough to call my friend! Blood speaks for itself Caleb and yours is red clear through.”

  He put the binoculars back up to view the distant pair again. “And besides, this is the most fun I’ve had in years!”

  “I think I’ve had enough relationship building for the day.” Deshavi said, as she wiped a smeared drop of sweat from her brow with one dirty hand.

  Trent looked up as she laid her shovel against the side of the ditch. She looked exhausted and yet even more beautiful than when she had first come. She had dirt smears all over her face and her hair had come free of the braid that it had been bound in. Her shirt and pants were scuffed up with soil stains and her designer boots would never be the same again.

  Trent leaned his shovel against the side and went to help get her out of the dig site. She politely thanked him and started to head for her horse.

  “Thanks for your help today Deshavi.” She nodded and lifted a hand, but didn’t turn back.

  He grimaced as he noticed her limping slightly. Her ankle had folded over earlier when her foot had slipped off the shovel.

  They’d work for the most part in silence, but Trent’s mind had been busy solving the riddle of Deshavi’s appearance at the dig site today. “Is your grandfather offering you some form of payment to be with me?”

  Deshavi stopped dead in her tracks, her body seeming to hum with an intensity of some decision. Trent was pretty sure he’d hit the nail on the head.

  “Turn around and tell me the truth or we are finished right here and now.”

  Reluctantly she turned back to face him, her face full of the indecision of what to say. She looked down and to the left briefly before she started to speak. He cut her off by stepping closer to her and grasping her chin, which he pulled up until their faces were close.

  “Look me in the eye and tell me.”

  It was more of a moan than a legible syllable, but he recognized, “Yes”.

  “How much?”

  Her eyes darted to the side and he abruptly shook her head hard his fingers somewhat rough in their strong grasp of her chin.

  “How much?” He repeated.

  She mumbled something.

  “Louder!”

  “Thirteen and a half million! Now let go of me!”

  She shoved backward from him and turned back toward her horse, but not before he saw the quick tears coming down her face. From some well of hidden energy she ran the rest of the way to her horse and vaulted up into the saddle with an ease that bespoke of her Indian heritage. She tore out down the valley, as if the devil himself was behind her.

  “He just managed to drag out something extremely hard to find in Deshavi.” I commented as Ted and I watched the passionate breakup scene.

  “Oh and what’s that?” Ted asked.

  “The truth. That’s no act she put on storming out of there like that. I think you were wrong about something Ted.”

  “What?”

  “I don’t think Trent is the surrendering party in this affair.”

  We both watched as the solitary figure that was Trent slapped his thigh viciously with a fist.

  Ted chuckled, “I think we were both wrong my friend! I’m leaning more toward a mutual surrender now.”

  He had a point, “You could be onto something there.”

  Trent started walking toward us.

  Ted abruptly sat up, “Quick hide the binoculars on yo
ur way out! He’ll no doubt be somewhat sore in regards to your involvement in this little matchmaking operation of ours.”

  I quickly stood up, “I need to go do damage control with Deshavi anyway.

  “I’ll do likewise from this side of things.” Ted echoed.

  I quickly left, stashing the binoculars in a cabinet, on my way out of Ted’s cabin. I mounted up at the front of the cabin and quickly headed off into the adjoining forest so that I wouldn’t be seen. In some ways I felt like a little boy trying to hide secret misdeeds from my parents all over again.

  Ted relaxed back into his chair as he watched his grandson approach. He glanced over at his friend’s vacant chair and a shot of alarm went through him. He’d left his glass!

  Quickly Ted leaned over and snatched it up only to then toss it underhanded into some nearby bushes. Trent drew near and his gaze was decidedly suspicious. He reached his hand down and felt the seat cushion of the vacant chair and Ted sighed. The game was up.

  “You’re into this knee-deep too!”

  Trent’s hands landed on either side of Ted’s somewhat robust form to grip the armrests tightly. Ted met his anger grandson’s eyes as he loomed up over him.

  “Let me make something very clear Theodore Charles Rogerson. I do not need any help in procuring either a girlfriend or a lifelong mate!”

  Ted wasn’t intimidated though, “To heck you don’t! Your thirty six going on thirty seven and to my knowledge you haven’t had a girlfriend since junior high so get over it! You need help boy and fortunately you have help in the form of two experienced veterans of love’s tumultuous pathways, in me and my friend Caleb.”

  Trent snorted sarcastically and Ted cuffed him sharply.

  “You may not of had a father boy, but I taught you better than to disrespect your elders! Me and Caleb may be old, but we’ve done our time and we deserve respect for what we’ve made it through in life and if you’re smart you’ll listen to us!”

  Trent repeated sullenly, “I don’t need any help!”

  “And I say that you do! It’s high time you woke up in the morning and had a place to put that morning wood plank of yours!”

  “Grandfather!” Trent exclaimed as his face turned red with embarrassment.

  “Don’t grandfather me boy! It’s a fact of life. Woman was created to fill the need a man has here, here, and here!” Ted stormed on gesturing to Trent’s groin, heart, and head.

  “Time to stop being afraid of life and of ending up like your father! Time to risk yourself in an endeavor you’re not sure of, but nevertheless have a created need for. Time to grab something you want out of life and stopping being just a good hearted spectator! Sometimes to do just that you have to get your hands a little dirty. Deshavi isn’t any paradigm of maidenly virtue I know and to be frank with you boy I was hoping for more for you, but you have to play the cards you’re dealt.”

  Ted rose out of his chair and backed his grandson against the wall of the cabin until his portly belly touched against his grandson’s ribbed musculature stomach, but it was Ted who dominated, as he raised a shaking finger to waive just below Trent’s nose, “Now this is what you’re going to do boy.....”

  Deshavi’s door was open and I stepped into the room where she had spent most of her childhood and early teenage years. Her bags were strewn onto the bed and crudely packed, as if in a hurry and I sighed, Deshavi was running away again. The bathroom door was closed and I could hear her sniffling. I tapped on the door and I heard a stir of water and a cessation of noise. I opened the door and cautiously stepped in as Deshavi sank below the piled up suds of her bubble bath a little more.

  Her eyes were red and her face was swollen from crying, but her expression was nothing but surprise, as I stepped into the bathroom and sat down on the edge of the tub. Normally I never invaded someone’s privacy like this, but this time was different. Self-consciously she reached a hand up to brush her wet hair and I reached out and gently captured it. I turned her wet hand over and spread her fingers out to look at her palm. She had blisters everywhere.

  I glanced up at her, “For what it’s worth I’m proud of your actions today.”

  She glanced downward.

  “You told him about our deal didn’t you?”

  She nodded, “He asked.”

  “You told him the truth?”

  “I wasn’t going to, but I did. He wasn’t going to accept anything less from me.” She started to cry again.

  “Are you this upset because you lost thirteen and a half million dollars or is it because of something else?”

  Her voice caught on a sob, “I don’t know!”

  I leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead, “We’ll talk later, but take your time and finish your bath first.”

  I left her then. Fifteen minutes later my cell phone rang. It was Ted. I answered it and listened.

  “You old dog you!” I said shaking my head, as I hung up.

  Ted was a good many years my senior at seventy eight, but he still knew how to play a hand of poker well. I went out on the front porch and waited. Another fifteen minutes went by and then I saw the trail of dust kicked up by my pickup, as it rounded a corner in the trail. I waited till he was closer before going back into the house. I knocked on the bathroom door again and it opened to reveal Deshavi wrapped up in a towel with her hair all wet.

  “You hungry?”

  “Not really, why?”

  “Oh I just thought I’d ask since your dinner date is here.”

  She blinked at me in open consternation, “What?”

  “Trent has come to take you to dinner.”

  Her jaw fell open and then words poured out, “I’m not ready! I don’t have clothes picked out! I need makeup! Why’s he here? Does he look mad? What am I going to do?” Her voice had only risen in hysteria with each new question.

  I squeezed her shoulders firmly, “Calm down Deshavi. I’m sure he won’t mind waiting a few minutes. Throw some clothes on and don’t even bother with the makeup stuff, you don’t need it.”

  She squeezed out of my grasp and I doubted that any of my words had registered in her consciousness. I decided to try something.

  “Looks like you have another chance at getting the money.” I said loudly.

  It was clear that she hadn’t even heard me, as she stood in front of the mirror holding up different shirts as she talked to herself in a fast-paced jumble of womanese. I smiled as I backed away from the sight of her fevered preparations. She was too busy getting ready to go out with her man to even give money a second thought, which said louder than words, as to what her interest in Trent was made of. It was a good sign.

  I made my way back through the house unable to wipe the smile from off my face. I slipped a bottle into my pocket just before I stepped outside onto the porch. Trent looked up from where he leaned back against the hood of the truck. His arms were tightly crossed and his face was full of displeasure. His scowl only deepened, as he noticed my sunny disposition. I didn’t let his bad mood be a killjoy to my own uplifted spirit though.

  His lips tight from pent-up anger moved as he said, “I’m only here because I thought the old man would have a stroke if I didn’t come. I suppose you know that I’ve come to take Deshavi out for dinner in town?”

  I nodded as I drew near to him. I pulled the bottle out and briefly holding it up I dropped it and his hand under force of training snaked out and caught it in midair. He turned the bottle around studying it.

  “Liniment?” He asked puzzled looking back up at me.

  “What’s it for?” He asked.

  “I’ll give you a hint. It does wonders for bruised skin and sore muscles.”

  He still looked at me blankly not understanding. That was all right. I’m sure he’d figure it out later and thank me for it. Nothing like an innocent hand or foot massage to pave the way of getting to touch the object of his desires and create a thirst for more.

  “Give her a
few minutes and Trent?”

  He glanced at me questioningly.

  “Have her home before 10.”

  He gave me a ‘are you serious look’ before grudgingly nodding.

  I heard the door open and Deshavi stumbled out. Her hair was still somewhat wet, but otherwise she was a five-minute wonder of feminine display. It took a moment for Trent to unglue himself from gazing at her. He quickly opened the passenger side door and she got in. I watched her eyes track him all the way around the front hood of the truck, until he got in and then they were headed down off the mountain.

  How tumultuous young love can be. In the pits of despair one moment and then higher than the stars the next moment. I remembered it well. I just hoped they behaved themselves. I knew how hard that was to do to, but it was a fight worth fighting for. So many didn’t see that anymore, but it was nevertheless a truth.

  The day turned into evening and then night. I saw the pickups lights in the distance. I pressed my cell phone and the display lid up, 9:54. The boy was cutting it close.

  The truck pulled up and I could see the dim outline of Trent getting out and opening Deshavi’s door. He said something and I heard Deshavi’s mirthful laughter ring out. It was a good sound to hear. As Trent pulled away, Deshavi, after looking after the truck for a long moment, made her way onto the porch. She sensed my presence and stopped. She looked like she wanted to say something, but didn’t. Instead she came over to me and I stood up. Her arms came around me tightly and not since for a long time my arms found their way around her.

  “Thank you grandpa!”

  I nodded and after a while we separated and she went inside. I walked out into the night and made my way down to my knees in the dirt and said my own thank you to my Heavenly Father.

  The days passed by and summer began and with it the heat, but in some ways I think the heat of the day failed in comparison to the blaze that had erupted between Deshavi and Trent. It was a wonder how they kept their clothes on, but Trent remained a gentleman and Deshavi respected my wishes. The two were inseparable. They went everywhere and did everything with each other. If one listened hard enough one could hear the wedding bells in the distance, at least I hoped so.