Free My Only One by Lindsay McKenna Page B

better, though.”
    “And this ex-husband? Is he in jail?”
    Abby shook her head, so angry that she wanted to cry. “Susan divorced Steve and then he skipped town and hasn’t paid a cent in alimony.
    “Susan works long hours and Courtney lives half her life at day-care. When she goes to school next year, she’ll be a latch-key kid, someone who goes home to an empty house because the parent has to work.”
    “It doesn’t sound like a very healthy situation.”
    “You’re right. But in America, both parents frequently have to work to make enough for the family to live on. Unfortunately, it’s the kids who suffer.”
    “Has Susan fallen in love with another man?”
    Sadly, Abby shook her head. “When you have something like that happen to you, Alec, it breaks your faith and trust in men in general. Not all men are like Steve, but Susan still has to learn to trust all over again, and it’s not easy. No, she’s single and frankly, with her work hours, she doesn’t have time for a significant other.”
    “Significant other?”
    She smiled. “A slang term for a boyfriend or a steady guy.”
    He shared her strained smile. “I think Susan will find a man who has her kind of strength.”
    “You’re more hopeful than she is, that’s for sure. She’s grown up a lot since this thing with Steve and realizes there just aren’t too many men around that she’d like to get involved with. Susan’s content to wait, even if she’s lonely.”
    “I can’t disagree with her decision,” Alec said. His hunger to know Abby on a personal level drove him on to ask her, “What of your family?”
    She smiled softly. “I came out of a normal home, so to speak. In fact, my dad is my strongest supporter. I’ve inherited his tenacity and discipline.”
    “And your mother? How much of her is in you?”
    Relaxing against the couch, Abby smiled wistfully. “I’m a lot like her in every other way. I have her red hair, although now she’s got red and gray hair. She’s always been a firebrand. Back in the seventies, she marched for the feminist movement and now she works part-time in Washington.
    “My folks live in La Jolla, California, but my mother flies back and forth to lobby for pro-women and pro-family legislation.”
    “Sounds like you are from a politically active family.”
    Abby shrugged. “I don’t consider us political at all. We’re just a family who cares about our quality of life, and the future of our children and our planet. And we’re willing to give our beliefs more than lip service. We go out and try to change the conditions we don’t like.”
    Draining the last of the wine from his glass, Alec set it on the coffee table. “I like people with a commitment. On board whatever ship I served, I try to get my people involved, to care, like you do.” He scowled. “Before
glasnost,
it was almost impossible because most people were afraid of the KGB spies among us. Now with this new openness, even the most diehard Communist is relenting a little, and personal expression and freedom is finally being allowed to surface.”
    “I just hope,” Abby said with fervency, “that
glasnost
and
perestroika
are real, Alec, and not overturned.”
    “You think General Secretary Gorbachev is a wolf in sheep’s clothing?”
    Uncomfortable, Abby tried to choose her words carefully. “America has had forty years of the Cold War, Alec. Most people are distrustful of
glasnost.
Everyone wants it to work, but we’re wary. But believe me, no one would love to see the nuclear race come to an end more than me.”
    “But…?”
    She smiled suddenly. “You have the most unerring way of reading my mind.”
    “I see the doubt register in your eyes, Abby. As an officer, it’s a skill one develops to know how your men are really feeling or what they’re thinking.”
    “In this country, there’s hope that
glasnost
is for real. At the same time, there are large factions who distrust General Secretary Gorbachev. They think