by Regina Duke
“You have every right, but you don’t want your dad to go to jail, so what else is there?”
Rose took in air loudly through her nose. “I think I might need to talk to Chrissie.”
Now Zinnia was uncomfortable. “Maybe later? I mean, for all we know, someone else is the father of her baby.”
Rose deflated. “Okay,” she moaned. “Then I need to know for sure. I need to go out to Chester’s place and ask him face to face.”
Mrs. Stigliano held up a hand. “After pizza,” she said. “Besides, it’s dark and cold and maybe you should go in the morning.”
“Mom….”
Mr. Stigliano drummed his fingers on the table. “Maybe I should call his parents.”
“Oh Daddy, he’s a grown man.”
But he wasn’t talking to Rose. He was talking to his wife, and her expression made it clear she didn’t think that was the best idea. “And maybe we should stay out of it,” she said, pushing meaning into the words that had nothing to do with the conversation.
He sighed, glanced at Zinnia, then agreed. “You’re right, as usual.”
Rose narrowed her eyes and peered at them suspiciously, first one and then the other. “What?” she asked.
Mrs. Stigliano looked suddenly as innocent as a newborn. The doorbell rang and Mr. Stigliano got up to answer it. Zinnia thought he might have muttered, “Saved by the bell” as he went, but she couldn’t be sure.
Rose tried again. “What are you hiding?”
Her mother looked offended. “Rose, sweetie, how can you say that? We don’t hide things from you.”
Rose closed one eye and stared with the other one. At last, as her father returned with the pizza box, she backed off. “Okay. If you say so.”
Zinnia inhaled deeply. She was so relieved that Rose wasn’t insisting on calling Chrissie. “Oh, the pizza smells heavenly!”
Rose’s parents were highly entertaining and an hour passed without Zinnia even noticing. But once the pizza crusts and the box were disposed of, Rose went right back to her own outrage. “Maybe I should go over there,” she said, glancing at the wall clock. Her father got up and stretched. Zinnia wondered if he planned to grab his shotgun.
“Text him first,” said her mother. “It’s getting late.”
Rose gave her mom a withering look, as if to say, ‘Only old people think eleven is late.’
Zinnia, however, agreed. “It is getting late,” she said. “I should go. Rose, would you take me back to the hotel?”
“You’re not staying there without me,” said Rose. “I’m the assistant to the assistant, remember?” She hung her head. “Okay. I guess we should go.”
“No one goes anywhere,” said Mr. Stigliano, returning with a Scrabble box in hand. “It’s not often that we get to play teams. You young ladies against this old married couple.” It was obvious to Zinnia that he did’t want Rose going out to Chester’s place in the middle of the night.
Rose groaned. “Daddy, I’m too upset to play Scrabble.”
He sat down and lifted the lid off the box. “Upset? Why? Because you made the right decision and called off the wedding? You already did the hard part, honeybun. Now you’re just pissed off because your worst fears have been confirmed. Nothing like a game of Scrabble to calm the nerves.”
Zinnia giggled. “Come on, Rose. This will be fun. My folks never play board games.” She saw Mr. Stigliano wink at his wife, one of those complicit moments between married people, and she tried to remember what they had said earlier that would prompt such a wink. But no luck. Just in case, though, she insisted, “No cheating.”
For a moment, Rose’s parents looked like deer caught in the headlights of honesty, then they laughed at the very same moment.
“No worries,” said Mrs. Stigliano. “Zinnia, dear, you pick your letters first.”
* * *
Bart was furious. He’d spent three hours on the phone, first with Woodsy, then with some shipping clerk in Newark, then a self-important petty official in Marseilles who claimed to know nothing about the shipment of Bart’s works of art until Bart cussed him out in French. At that point, the fellow admitted that there had been a problem and some paperwork had been misplaced, but he wasn’t sure if he was able to make it right. Then back to Woodsy, who was, as Bart reminded her, obligated to help him get his work to New York in time to set up for the art show. He also reminded her if there was no show, no art, nothing, he was quite certain that the Chens would find a new manager for their gallery.
Just as he was wondering if he’d have to fly back to France to solve the problem, by some miracle, the fellow in Marseilles—being sure to point out how hard he had worked to be of service—found the misplaced papers. However, he wasn’t sure all the signatures were valid. After Bart offered to wire him a small gift for his efforts—twenty thousand Euros—the fellow re-examined the documents and realized that, yes, the signatures were excellent. He’d found another page with the signatures on it and they matched, so obviously all the signatures were valid.
By midnight, Bart was ready to fall into bed. He wondered briefly how things were going with Zinnia and Rose. He hoped that the news about Chrissie didn’t consume Zinnia and take her mind off her art. Although he found himself nearly consumed with this stupid shipping problem, poor Zinnia didn’t have twenty thousand Euros to clean up the mess at her parent’s house. It wasn’t fair of him to expect her to ignore what had to be a shocking piece of news in order to ensure that they had more in her portfolio before heading to New York.
Just as he was about to call their suite—surely she wouldn’t mind him calling this late, but then again what if she did? Did he want to make her angry on top of all that family stress?—his cell phone pinged and he received a text from Don.
“Just wanted to let you know, Ashley is being kept overnight for observation. Rayna says Zinnia will want an update.”
“Wonderful,” muttered Bart. “My excuse to wake her up just arrived.” He texted back a quick thank you, but before he could punch Zinnia’s suite number into the room phone, his cell pinged again.
How can a person be irritated and relieved all at the same time, he wondered. Irritated because it was Don again, and relieved that it wasn’t Woodsy. But then, it was two a.m. in New York. He tried to figure out if the French clerk had been at the beginning or end of his shift but gave up when the effort to calculate international time differences caused a throbbing behind his right eye. He took a deep breath and read Don’s text.
“BTW Dad called here looking for you. He says you didn’t even stop by to say hello on your way through New York. He’s not happy.”
Bart groaned and tilted his head back to stare at the ceiling. But there was no witty response scrawled across the white paint, so he looked down at his cell and texted, “Thanks for the heads up.”
Don texted back, “Rayna went to visit Ashley with Taylor. She says Ashley keeps talking about having Zinnia in town to run the gallery while she recovers. Do women recover from pregnancy? How long do you think she’ll be in the hospital?”
Bart growled at his phone. “Who cares?” he snarked to himself. Then he remembered that Zinnia would care...a lot. He wanted this conversation over with, so he texted back, “Don’t know. (Frown emoji) I’ll talk to you tomorrow. (Heart emoji)”
That did the trick. Don said good night, and Bart stared at his room phone, still puzzling over his dilemma—to call or not to call. “What the heck,” he mumbled. “She’ll want to know how Ashley’s doing.” He picked up the room phone and dialed Zinnia’s suite number.
After twelve rings a sweet voice interrupted and informed him, “That number isn’t answering. Would you like to leave a message?”
“No thanks.” He hung up. Where could they have gone? Rose was sleeping on the sofa and he knew there was a room phone right by her head. Well, he had her cell number, so he’d teach her to ignore a ringing phone. He found her in his contacts and punched in the call.
After two rings,
Rose answered. “Hello?”
Bart snapped, “Where are you at almost one in the morning???”
“My, my, aren’t we becoming possessive? Remind you of anyone?”
“Rose…” The word was practically a threat.
Rose softened her tone. “We’re at my parents’ house, playing Scrabble and planning some revenge. Come on over. The more the merrier.” She hung up without letting him talk to Zinnia. He didn’t even know who they were plotting revenge against.
He grabbed his keys and charged out the door. A second later he came back and grabbed his warmest jacket. Darned Colorado February. He figured Rose didn’t expect him to take her up on her invitation, but dammit, he hadn’t seen Zinnia in almost four hours and he knew he wouldn’t be able to sleep until he knew she was all right. Okay, that’s an excuse, but it works for me. I wonder if Rayna had this effect on Don?
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Ten minutes later, after Rose spoke to Bart on the phone, Zinnia was yawning, ready for bed. “We should get going, Rose,” she prodded mildly.
“I know, but we’re only fifty points behind Mom and Dad! We can still win this. There are a dozen tiles left.”
Zinnia assumed her Gone with the Wind voice. “Lordy, I had no idea y’all were so fiercely competitive. All this tension is making my little heart go pitty-pat, I do declare.” The sound of the doorbell elicited a tiny Scarlet-like scream and scared the southern drawl right out of her.
Mr. Stigliano chuckled. “I’ll get it,” he said, as if visitors at one a.m. were a perfectly normal occurrence. A few moments later, he returned with Bart Hazen right behind him.
“Bart!” Zinnia’s pleasure at seeing him was hard to disguise.
“Hello everyone,” said Bart, leaning over to plant a quick kiss on Zinnia’s cheek. “I decided to take Rose up on her invitation.” He spread his hands. “Is the game almost over?”
Mrs. Stigliano stood up stiffly. “We’ll have a rematch,” she said, “after I sleep for a week. Good night, kids.”
Mr. Stigliano took his cue from his wife. “Maybe we should start on a Saturday morning. Give us more time.” He shook a warning finger at the girls. “Behave yourselves.” Then he winked at them before following his wife out of the room.
Rose began putting the Scrabble game away. “Gee, Bart, I never thought for a moment you’d actually come over.”
“Obviously. Don’t give me a hard time. I’ve spent three agonizing hours battling with French bureaucracy, trying to get the rest of my paintings shipped to New York.”
“Are they shipping them at last?” asked Zinnia.
Bart shrugged and sank onto the chair next to her. “I hope so. I may have to make other arrangements to get it all here in time. I mean, to New York.”
Zinnia was amazed to realize that Bart’s arrival had given her a second wind. All fatigue seemed to disappear, and she thought she might be able to run a marathon if he was waiting at the finish line. She smiled into her own lap.
Bart tweaked her shoulder, a gentle pinch. “What’s so funny?”
Zinnia peeked sideways at him. “Not funny. Happy. Glad to see you.”
Rose put the lid on the Scrabble box. “Okay, great. You two are doing the happy dance on the grave of my relationship.” She sighed like a martyr. “I guess I’ll have to handle things all by myself.”
Zinnia raised a brow. “Rose? What are you going to do?”
Rose assumed the expression of innocence that always rang alarm bells for Zinnia. “Nothing. Just...feel like taking a drive...you know, to wind down from the Scrabble tension.”
Bart laughed out loud, but cut it off quickly when Zinnia elbowed him. She folded her hands on the table and asked sweetly, “And where exactly were you planning to drive?”
Rose tilted her head to one side. “I don’t know. Maybe I’ll take a drive in the country.”
“In the middle of the night? It’s way too late to go confront Chester.”
Rose spread her arms. “Bart knocked on our door in the middle of the night! Why shouldn’t I do the same to Cheating Chester?”
Bart looked a question at Zinnia who sighed and explained. “She wants to go scream at Chester for a while and ask if he’s the father of Chrissie’s baby.”
“Ohhhhh,” said Bart. “Well, then. At this time of night, she might need some reinforcements.”
Rose’s attitude changed from martyrdom to happy dance in an instant. “Really? You’d go with me?”
Bart said, “Why not? We’re all wide awake, and besides, it’ll be safer in my SUV than in your little car.”
Zinnia wasn’t sure if she should be excited about the adventure or terrified that Chester would have a gun loaded and ready. After all, if Mr. Stigliano could show up on the porch with a shotgun, surely a younger, more foolish man wouldn’t think twice about firing into the dark at uninvited guests. “Is this a good idea?” she asked uncertainly.
“No,” said Bart, “but hey, we can’t dance on the grave of Rose’s relationship without making amends, can we?”
Zinnia laughed. “Well, we’re only young once so we have to cram all our bad decisions into the non-parental parts of our lives, right?”
Rose, being a dutiful daughter, spent a few moments turning out lights and checking the lock on the front door before grabbing her father’s shot gun and heading out with her friends. A few seconds later, the lock clicked again and Zinnia opened the front door to calmly replace the shotgun where Rose had found it. “Now we can go,” she said.
Zinnia sat in the front seat, Bart drove, and Rose half-squatted in the space behind the middle console, giving directions to Chester’s trailer. When she directed him to leave the paved road and follow the two ruts to the left, Bart said, “If at any time you change your mind about this, please tell me before I break an axle on my rental.”
“Very funny,” said Rose.
Zinnia asked, “Aren’t you afraid he’ll think we’re burglars or something?”
“Out here?” Rose made a rude noise. “If you were a burglar would you bother with two ruts posing as a road?”
“No way,” said Bart.
Zinnia asked, “Does he have a gun?”
“He has six,” said Rose, “but he’s a lousy shot, and the guns are usually in a gun safe. We’ll have time to let him know who we are.”
Zinnia giggled. “Oh good. So he’ll know who he’s shooting.”
Rose groaned. “Zin, really, if you’re that nervous, you can wait in the car.”
Bart muttered, “With me.”
Zinnia laughed out loud. She knew that Rose’s plan was silly and a wee bit dangerous, but if you couldn’t ride through the dark with your BFF to give her ex a bad time in the middle of the night, then what was a best friend for?
After several minutes of maneuvering along the ruts, the SUV’s headlights hit the side of a white mobile home.
Rose ordered, “Kill the headlights. Can you coast toward the trailer?”
Bart shook his head. “You cannot coast uphill, Rose.”
“Oh, right. Okay.”
Bart got as close as he dared, then turned the SUV around.
Rose objected. “What are you doing?”
“When we leave, I want to be ready to drive straight down the hill,” said Bart. “In case Chester just happens to be in the middle of cleaning one of his guns.”
“There aren’t any lights on,” said Zinnia quietly.
“Good,” said Rose. “I’ve been looking forward to waking him up.” She barely waited for the vehicle to stop before hopping out the back door. She marched to the far end of the mobile home and banged on the side of it, underneath a window. “Wake up, you cheating SOB! I know you’re in there! Wake up!”
A light came on behind the window. A moment later the curtain was pulled back and a flashlight shone on Rose’s face. It disappeared immediately, accompanied by a male voice cursing and shouting as it moved toward the front end of the trailer. Three large lights came on along
the side of the trailer, and then the front door opened. Chester yelled, “Rose! What the heck are you doing? I’m going to come out there and beat the crap out of you!” He shoved the flimsy screen door open and emerged in his unbuttoned jeans, barefoot and bare-chested. His intent was clear—to storm out and intimidate Rose into getting back in her vehicle and driving away, although Zinnia recognized an underlying threat in his body language that might very well erupt in physical violence.
But Chester stopped short when he spotted Bart and Zinnia behind Rose. After a few more curses, he shouted, “Do you know what time it is?!”
Rose yelled back, “It’s time for me to tell you what a cheating pig you are!”
“What are you talking about?! You broke off our engagement, not me.”
“I broke it off because I saw those text messages you sent to Chrissie Klausen, you rat! How long were you dating both of us at the same time?”
Chester looked disgusted and perplexed at the same time. “You weren’t giving me nothing, were you? Not my fault if I had to look elsewhere.”
“Oh, you animal!” Rose charged at him, fists flailing, but before she could get close enough for him to retaliate, Bart pulled her back, then stepped in front of her.
“Maybe,” he said reasonably, “you could apologize for breaking Rose’s heart and we can all go home and go to bed.”
Rose yelled, “I want to kill him!”
Chester yelled back, “You’re scaring my cows!” Moos of varying intensity floated to them from the direction of a dark field.
“What’s going on?” A new voice called out from the trailer door. “Chester? It’s freezing out there. You’ll catch pneumonia.”
Zinnia shrieked, “Chrissie! What are you doing here?”
Chrissie flung open the screen door, not seeming to mind that all she had on was one of Chester’s wife-beaters. At least it was long enough to cover what Zinnia didn’t want to see. Chrissie flipped her hair and sassed her sister. “What does it look like I’m doing, you stupid cow?”
Zinnia felt all the old insults piled up in that one epithet, and before she could think about what she was saying, she yelled, “You’re sleeping with the father of your baby, you horny witch!”