I explained Wisdom’s situation. She sympathized and began shelling the boiled eggs for the potato salad. At least she was comfortable in a kitchen. Eventually we moved past the small talk, and in a lull, I asked, “How’s it going Sandy?”
“Tense.”
I was thinking potato salad. But Sandy was thinking of something else. Was she speaking about her relationship with Luis or talking about her current state of mind? Maybe all her earlier abruptness had to do with being anxious about meeting us.
“Want a beer?”
“Sure.”
“That’s a pretty shirt. Where’d you get it?”
“You like it? I think it clashes with my hair, but Luis loves it, so…” She let the comment linger and returned to the potatoes.
I took in her outfit more closely. She was wearing a red and orange print shirt that was so tight and revealing it could have been an elaborate tattoo. Her strawberry blond hair was pinned up in curls on top of her head. Her shorts were short. Way short.
Oh to be young again, I mused.
I was looking for a way to broach the subject of Luis going undercover on campus when Sandra went just where I wanted to go.
“I really hate that Luis is thinking of risking his life for a living, Rachel.”
I took a sip of my beer.
“Okay.”
I waited.
“I mean, it’s dangerous being a PI, right? Just look what happened to you.”
“I guess it can be, Sandy, but usually it’s downright boring. I wouldn’t say that what just happened to me, being shot and having to shoot someone else, is the norm for a private investigator at all. And there probably are dangers associated with most work people choose to do.”
A stock answer to hide my discomfort that she would use my experience with Eddie Stowall to try to get her boyfriend to stop his apprenticeship with us.
We didn’t need someone on campus yet, but the situation with Abigail was escalating, and Luis really was the best choice. Maybe we could get Will Townsend in as a repairman, or a volunteer. But it was a long shot.
Luis looked young enough to pass for a high school student and his good looks—dark brown hair on the longish side, square jaw, sea blue eyes in a smooth complexion—and geek tall, would help him connect with the thirteen year old Abigail.
I changed the subject.
“The reason I asked about your blouse is that I’ve noticed you and Luis manage to dress like superstars. It makes me wonder about my own choice of clothes.”
Sandy stopped peeling the boiled potatoes and eyed me.
“Well…you could use some younger looking duds. But I frankly just shop at the usual outlet chains. Maybe if you picked up some teen magazines you could get a feel for their styles.”
Teen magazines? It was all I could do to suppress a laugh. She was trying so hard not to embarrass the middle aged woman in the room. Sweet.
I picked up a couple more appetizers and carried them out to the deck. Luis was sprawled on the rattan couch, his long legs spread out before him. A cleaned-up cowboy relaxing after a long day of work on the ranch.
I’d walked in on the same conversation we were dancing around in the kitchen.
“So, are you okay with taking assignments for now, Luis?”
“Oh sure. She’s…don’t worry about it, Matt. Sandy will cope. She’s just a little teary right now. Probably PMS. What do you think about those Chargers?”
Teary? I hadn’t noticed. I decided not to raise the subject of his work with her again. As I left, the conversation lightened as the two men launched into a spirited football discussion.
Chapter 29
While I was gone, Sandra had brooded, and she dropped a small bomb on me.
“You know, Rachel I’d have left this guy long ago but he’s the best thing I’ve had between my legs. Ever. By a mile. I just can’t get enough of him.”
I picked up my jaw and pulled the garlic bread from the oven, briefly wondering how long it had been since I’d heard that kind of girl talk. Not since I was in my twenties and early thirties, I mused. Of course, I asked the stupid question.
“So are you famously jealous of him?”
Sandra’s turn to drop jaw. She one-eyed me, wondering if I were competition or not. She decided not.
“Uh, no. I mean, he’s mine…. Oh, crap…sure I am. Every female who looks at him makes me want to commit murder. And believe me, girls know. They can read him like a book. A very sexy book. They can smell him from a mile away.”
“Pheromones,” I muttered.
“Yeah. But he’s such a big idiot with this private investigator thing. And he hasn’t a clue he’s so sexy. Which makes me wonder, if he’s so dumb about that how will he survive out in the streets? He needs to get on with his life and decide for real what he wants to do. He’s almost twenty-eight. And I’m zeroing in on thirty. We don’t have time to waste.”
Hasn’t a clue? Maybe she was the one who was clueless. Luis was our resident geek, and he was masterful at computer snooping. Of course, we have no idea how or where he finds the information he occasionally supplies us with. It isn’t at any of the professional websites I use with my end of the research.
“Well, I guess that remains to be seen, Sandy. Lots of training makes them smarter. Come on, let’s join the studs.” We were in dangerous territory if she was doing PMS; I was taking a side path out. So call me a coward.
We picked up the remaining dishes and walked out toward the setting sun. Wisdom had finally been lured away from his listening post by the smell of steaks being delivered to the table.
We sat, and I bowed my head silently as the thought that this might be one of the last times our dog joined us for dinner briefly threatened my emotional equilibrium. Thank you for today.
When I looked up, Matt and I shared a smile. We rarely prayed aloud, but were comfortable with each other’s silent offerings.
I have to admit at this point that I spent much of the rest of our party sneaking peeks at Luis. He was looking more and more gorgeous every minute. Sandra should have kept her juicy gossip to herself. But after our second round of red was poured Matt had to go and ruin everything.
“So, as I was saying Luis, you need to clear the decks during the next few days to help keep an eye on Abigail. Frankly the sooner you’re on the high school campus the better.”
He was testing Sandy. I was watching Luis as he resumed his slouched down, legs splayed position on the deck couch. I slapped my eyeballs, scolding them for glancing at his crotch. Luis was my two favorite kinds of men, Irish and Italian all rolled up in one.
And young enough to be my son. Sigh.
Whoa! I put my glass of wine down and didn’t pick it up again. I was getting stupid.
“Campus? What campus? Abigail who?” Sandy blurted.
“Abigail Pustovoytenko…and don’t even try to say her name until you’ve practiced it at least six times alone.” I said, trying for casual humor.
Matt proceeded to bring Sandra up to speed. I thought she was following, but Sandra was stuck back on high school.
Chapter 30
“That school where those boys were from? The five that were killed?”
“Six. The last one just died today,” Matt said. Our eyes met. He was being too rough with her.
“Jesus. No kidding. I thought they were going to pull him through,” Luis said, and shook his head sadly.
“All those pretty young girls….” Sandra’s voice trailed off.
I thought she’d meant to say boys, but suddenly a vision of sexy Luis watching Abigail on campus with all those pretty young girls…while Sandra watched Luis, maybe with a gun under her skin-tight skirt, blossomed in my head.
I stood and carried some of the plates into the kitchen, hoping Sandra would follow me. But she stayed behind, and as I rounded the corner back out to join them a few minutes later I could hear the voices rising.
“No way! The Chargers were totally blanking the Chiefs last mont
h. They haven’t got a chance this Sunday!” Thank goodness they were back to sports.
“Commonnn. You and your Chargers,” Luis moaned.
I plopped a chocolate on chocolate cake piled an inch high with frosting down in front of them. This is a really mean trick I play.
“Rachel! What are you thinking? I’m trying to diet.”
I smiled innocently and cut three pieces, placing a plate before each of them.
“Where’s yours, girlfriend?”
“Oh, I can’t eat chocolate, Sandra. Makes my tongue swell up. But I enjoy watching others…”
“Oh, that is low, really low.”
“Give it to me, Sandy.” Matt the hero.
“No way, I’ll eat it darlin’. Give it over.” Luis the sex god.
Sandra smiled at them teasingly, then took the eenciest piece off the end. Then another, then another.
Okay, were we doing Tom Jones here?
This time I slapped my brain, and turned to give Wisdom a hug. His was pressed up against me, still hoping I’d give him some leftover steak.
“Cooked beef is no good for you boy. It gives you the runs, remember?” I muttered to him.
He knew. Like I knew my tongue would swell when I sampled a little of the frosting from the side of the cake later on. When no one was watching.
“By the way, Luis, did you get a chance to observe the homeschooling group yet?” Matt.
“You’ve already begun?” Sandra said.
“I did better than that. I have a date with two of the teen girls next Monday, a two-fer. Boy, are they hot.”
Sandy slapped his leg hard enough to make mine hurt. Luis laughed a little too loudly.
He sounded like my boys when their voices were changing, deep most of the time, but still giggly like a girl’s. He was feeling his wine, too.
“Just kidding, sweetie’. Actually, they aren’t bad looking once you get past the baby fat and pimples. They’re a typical group of adolescents, really. Although there does seem to be some upper age limit. The oldest in the group—a real skinny guy—looked to be about fourteen, the rest were maybe eleven or twelve. Maybe Abigail is just doing what all homeschool kids end up doing. Moving on.
“Anyway, I caught them at the skating rink. I didn’t see anything unusual going on. Looked like a nice bunch of kids. Same with the handful of parents with them.”
Matt nodded, took another bite. He was thinking Sandy was okay with this. But then she straightened him out.
“Luis isn’t ready to do undercover work.”
“I’ll give him all the training he needs, Sandy. It’s really not a dangerous assignment,” Matt said. “We’re working out the details of how we’re going to get him on campus now.” He was using his Marine management style to just steamroll over any objections and keep moving forward.
Made me nuts sometimes, but when it worked, it was okay. Tonight it didn’t work because Sandy wasn’t used to Marines.
“Hey, I’ll be okay Sandy. How dangerous can a high school be, anyway?” Luis said.
“Right. He’ll be fine, Sandy.” Matt.
“You haven’t been in school for quite a long time, Colonel. This isn’t like sending one of your men off…”
“Sandy, take it easy…”
“It’s okay, Luis. That’s why we’re here, to talk through this.” Matt said.
But Sandy was shaking her head dramatically.
“High school campuses, as you so quaintly call them, are war zones. Didn’t you notice the ten foot tall chain link barriers go up last year? Those fences aren’t about terrorists from the Middle East, they’re about terrorists from just south of the border. And maybe to keep the little oversexed monsters inside.”
“Come on, Sandy. That’s really over the top…”
I caught Matt’s eye and did a little head shake. He didn’t interfere between them again.
“You don’t know. Even ten years ago when I was attending it was a sick, dangerous place. High schools are…full of drugs…and hormone crazed kids being fed every kind of designer pill the marketplace can produce.”
I put a gentle hand on her arm, thinking if she kept letting these emotions build I might have to hold her in my arms to quiet her down like I’d just done with Wisdom. She stopped.
Was there more going on here than fear for Luis’ safety?
But Sandra pulled away and turned to confront Luis again, her eyes filling with tears.
“They…I was….” And she stopped again, waving her hands in front of her face as if batting at invisible bugs. She inhaled deeply then began again.
“Luis, it’s not the same for guys as for girls. It’s just not the same.”
She shook head again and stopped herself for good. She wiped away the tears on her cheeks and settled back in her seat.
“Sorry. Too much wine, I guess.”
“It’s okay Sandy.” Luis said.
Luis wasn’t seeing the pain she was holding back. He was too young and the moment of truth had passed.
And I was shamed by my relief. I didn’t want to think about what must have happened to her as a teenager—and she really didn’t want us to know, either.
Wisdom turned sharply toward his listening station, large ears at attention, and suddenly I heard them too. Braying and stomping their hoofs. The zebras were chasing a giraffe again. A cruel game the giraffe was defenseless against.
Then I remembered that the zebras were in different section now. Too many silly giraffe tails had been bobbed without benefit of anesthesia.
Sandy slowly stood, and I said, “Do you hear them?”
“Yes! That’s amazing.”
“What?” Luis asked.
Maybe you had to have women’s ears. Sandy and I joined Wisdom and listened while another brief breeze carried us into the wilderness inside the San Diego wild park.
They left about an hour later, all calmed down, Sandy seemingly accepting the possibility that Luis might start doing undercover assignments.
But that night, after cleaning the kitchen and retreating to our bedroom to join my husband, I was suddenly filled with an urgent need. I took him like a she-wolf in heat.
He didn’t seem to mind.
And I never realized that I was a she-wolf going through a change from young to old.
Chapter 31
Late Sunday night, I dragged my brain up from sleep thinking to answer a ringing phone before Matt was disturbed.
It was a good thing I caught the call; Matt was growing increasingly perturbed by my unpaid services to the bee women and it was Abigail Pustovoytenko’s mom, Gloria. I tripped on the bed linens, steadied, surged forward again, stumbled again, and finally barked my right shin on the edge of a piece of furniture I’ve yet to identify.
Hopping a crazy path down the hall while alternately clutching my now screaming leg, I stirred the family pictures on the walls to life. Aunt Mable reached out and hit me. In the living room a kamikaze table took out my other knee.
For a brief moment I attempted to hold both shins and keep moving. Doesn’t work. The phone blared for the third time, still twenty feet away in the kitchen.
Then I finally woke up. I picked up the receiver a half second into the fourth ring.
Surely Matt was awake.
“Hello.” It was practically a scream.
After a pause Gloria said, “What are you doing?”
At least that’s what I think she said.
“Trying to get to the phone before it wakes Matt. He has a big day tomorrow.”
“You’re in bed?”
“Not any more.”
“Good, because I can’t rest either! You have so messed up my child….”
The rest of it I won’t bother to interpret. She was practically crying, also in sotto voce.
“Gloria, where are you?”
She continued. I think she said she was still at the hospital and I wondered how many hours she worked in one day. Surely now that the last boy was dead she could resume a
normal eight-hour day.
“…hat you for brrringing her halfway to the ospital…”
“Gloria, slow down.”
I was hoping she hadn’t just said she hates me. She stopped, then resumed.
“I did not tell er to bring er to the ose pital! She made that up. Now she is liar. Now she is vot every other brain-damaged child at public school is. Brain-damaged. There is no teaching there. It is factory for sitting on children!”
“I understand your feelings about this, Gloria, and on some levels I agree but….”
“And just to make you feel as bad as I do it isn’t tomorrow your husband has to vake, it is today! So there!”
With that she slammed the phone down. Called me back a minute later.
“Rachel! Oh no Rachel, it’s that girl, Judi. The girlfriend of the last survivor, Jimmy Vinters, they’ve just brought her in. She has taken pills. Vot will I tell my child?”
So Judi was Jimmy Winter’s girlfriend, not his sister.
Chapter 32
Monday, October 27, predawn
Gloria called me again in the early morning hours while I was out on the deck with Wisdom, listening to the elephants trumpet the approaching sun rise. She spoiled my coffee by telling me Judi Zimmer had died. She was sixteen.
My heart stilled, and I rose from the lounge chair with my cell phone pressed to my ear, pulling my thick terry robe tight around me, and retreated to warmth. The dog continued worshiping the sunrise, blessedly sneeze free, and blessedly unaware of the approach of death or anything at all about death. I hoped.
Then Gloria returned to her favorite topic, Abigail’s Big Mistake.
“If she survive her second week I be surprised. She’s too quiet. I think something wrong.” She was calmer this time, so her diction improved.
But again I must caution that I only think I know what Gloria is saying. Slavic accents are bedeviling--must be the Cyrillic alphabet.
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