The Key to Midnight Read Free Page A

ennui-drenched models currently in demand for magazine covers and television commercials. She was a vibrant, golden vision, with light amber skin and cascades of platinum-blond hair. She looked thirty, not sixteen, but her beauty was inexpressibly enhanced by every mark of experience and line of character.
    She belonged on a stage, not merely to be seen but to be heard. Her voice was first-rate. She sang with a tremulous clarity that pierced the stuffy air and seemed to reverberate within Alex. Though the lounge was crowded and everyone had been drinking, there was none of the expected nightclub chatter when Joanna Rand performed. The audience was attentive, rapt.
    He knew her from another place and time, although he could not recall where or when they’d met. Her face was hauntingly familiar, especially her eyes. In fact, he felt that he hadn’t just met her once before but had known her well, even intimately.
    Ridiculous. He wouldn’t have forgotten a woman as striking as this one. Surely, had they met before, he would be able to remember every smallest detail of their encounter.
    He watched. He listened. He wanted to hold her.

4
    When Joanna finished her last song and the applause finally faded, the band swung into a lively number. Couples crowded onto the dance floor. Conversation picked up again, and the lounge filled with sporadic laughter and the clatter of dinnerware.
    As she did every night, Joanna briefly surveyed her domain from the edge of the stage, allowing herself a moment of pride. She ran a damn good place.
    In addition to being a restaurateur, she was a practical social politician. At the end of her first of two hour-long performances, she didn’t disappear behind the curtains until the ten o’clock show. Instead, she stepped down from the stage in a soft swish of pleated silk and moved slowly among the tables, acknowledging compliments, bowing and being bowed to, stopping to inquire if dinner had been enjoyable, greeting new faces and chatting at length with regular, honored customers. Good food, a romantic atmosphere, and high quality entertainment were sufficient to establish a profitable nightclub, but more than that was required for the Moonglow to become legendary. She wanted that extra degree of success. People were flattered to receive personal attention from the owner, and the forty minutes that she spent in the lounge between acts was worth uncountable yen in repeat business.
    The handsome American with the neatly trimmed mustache was present for the third evening in a row. The previous two nights, they had exchanged no more than a dozen words, but Joanna had sensed that they wouldn’t remain strangers. At each performance, he sat at a small table near the stage and watched her so intently that she had to avoid looking at him for fear that she would become distracted and forget the words to a song. After each show, as she mingled with the customers, she knew without looking at him that he was watching her every move. She imagined that she could feel the pressure of his gaze. Although being scrutinized by him was vaguely disturbing, it was also surprisingly pleasant.
    When she reached his table, he stood and smiled. Tall, broad-shouldered, he had a European elegance in spite of his daunting size. He wore a three-piece, charcoal-gray Savile Row suit, what appeared to be a hand-tailored Egyptian-cotton shirt, and a pearl-gray tie.
    He said, “When you sing ‘These Foolish Things’ or ‘You Turned the Tables on Me,’ I’m reminded of Helen Ward when she sang with Benny Goodman.”
    “That’s fifty years ago,” Joanna said. “You’re not old enough to remember Helen Ward.”
    “Never saw her perform. But I have all her records, and you’re better than she was.”
    “You flatter me too much. You’re a jazz buff?”
    “Mostly swing music.”
    “So we like the same corner of jazz.”
    Looking around at the crowd, he said, “Apparently, so do the Japanese. I was told the Moonglow was