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"There's not much chance of that, Beth," he said seriously, and their eyes met again.
He averted his quickly, and very carefully poured the two glasses full.
"Starting with you being part of our wedding," she said.
"Not a chance."
"There's going to be an arch of swords outside the chapel. I'm sure Randy-you're classmates-would love to have you be one of the…whatever they're called."
"Beth, for Christ's sake, no. I can't stand the sonofabitch."
"I thought you didn't use that term. You preferred 'bastard.'"
"I didn't say I preferred it. I said that I wasn't a sonofabitch because my mother was the antithesis of a bitch."
He met her eyes again, averted them, picked up his martini glass, and took a healthy swallow.
"But you don't mind being called a bastard?"
"I am a bastard," he said, meeting her eyes. "There's not much I can do about it."
"A bastard being defined as someone who is hardheaded? Arrogant? Infuriating? And revels in it?"
"A bastard is a child born out of wedlock," Castillo said.
"I don't understand," she said. "Your parents weren't married?"
He shook his head.
He said: "The estimates vary that between fifty thousand and one hundred fifty thousand children were born outside the bonds of holy matrimony to German girls and their American boyfriends-some of whom were general officers. I am one of those so born. I'm a lot luckier than any of the others I've run into, but I'm one of them."
"Because of your father, you mean?"
"No. Because of my mother. My father wa
s only in at the beginning, so to speak. Because of my mother. My mother was something special."
"Why are you telling me this?" she asked.
"I don't know. Possibly in the hope that it will send you fleeing before this situation gets any more out of hand than it is."
"I want to hear this," she said. "Does my father know?"
"Your father is a very intelligent man. He's probably put it all together by now. Or your mother has. Or Abuela told them."
He took another sip of his martini.
As Beth watched, she said, "That's your second you're gulping down, you know."
"I can count. And as soon as you leave, I will have the third."
"I'm not leaving until you tell me. What happened?"
"When my father finished flight school, they sent him to Germany, rather than straight to Vietnam. They tried to do that, send kids straight from flight school over there. The idea was that they would build some hours, be better pilots when they got into combat. And while he was in Germany he met a German girl, and here I am."
"The sonofabitch!" Beth exploded.
"No. Now you're talking about his madre-my Abuela-and she is indeed another who is the antithesis of bitch."
