Rachel stood before her, looking up slightly, as Heather stood a few inches taller. That’s when Heather spotted the barrettes in Rachel’s blond hair. She wore a large, silver, horseshoe-shaped barrette on each side, and they sparkled under the ceiling lights.
“I understand that you and the other waitresses are unhappy with the new uniforms?”
“Oh, well, yes,” Heather looked down at herself. “They are a bit... immodest?”
Rachel smiled.
“Actually, I would say that it makes you look like a slut.”
Heather saw the glee in Rachel’s eyes as the last word left her mouth, but she kept silent, wondering what was coming next.
Rachel pointed to herself.
“The shirt I have on will be the new uniform top. I expect they’ll be delivered sometime this week.”
“Really?”
“Absolutely, we’ll also begin selling them at the bar. As I explained to my husband, the name Taggart’s means something around here, and I intend to market it fully.”
“These new shirts will be for everyone, even the waitresses?” Heather asked.
“Yes, does that please you?”
“Yes, and thank you,”
Rachel smiled, as if at a private joke.
“It’s the least I can do.”
“What do you mean?”
Rachel waved the question away.
“Nevermind, and please pass the word along to the other waitresses.”
“I will, is there anything else?”
“No, oh, but you are working until closing, right?”
“Yes.”
“Good, now please start your shift,” Rachel said, and again Heather saw the private smile.
As she opened the door to leave the office, Tim Hearn appeared, his eyes went directly to Heather’s cleavage.
“Oh, how I am going to miss these uniforms.”
“Hello Mr. Hearn,”
“Heather, please, call me Tim,”
“All right, but if you’ll excuse me I have to begin work.”
“Right, I’ll see you around,”
Heather squeezed past Hearn and went to her locker, where she grabbed an order book and her work apron. As she walked out into the bar and began taking orders from a table of six, she remembered Rachel’s wry little smile, and for some reason, it gnawed at her.
***
Hearn shut the door and sighed.
“I cannot believe that girl is wasting herself on that loser ex-husband of yours.”
“Oh don’t worry, that will be ending soon,”
“How do you know?”
Rachel smiled.
“Because I have a plan, and when I’m through she’ll want nothing to do with him.”
Hearn studied her for a moment.
“Why are you trying to break them up? You still want him don’t you?”
“We’ve been married for less than a year and I know that you’ve already strayed several times, so don’t preach to me. We both know that we’re not good at monogamy.”
“Parker may sleep with you, but he’ll never take you back.”
“I know that, and I’m very happy being your wife, I just can’t stand seeing him with that girl.”
Hearn walked over and sat on the edge of the desk.
“This plan of yours will really break them up?”
“Yes.”
“Then let me help you with it,”
“Why?”
“Well, the poor girl will need someone to console her, won’t she?”
“Yes she will, and if it’s you, Rick will be less inclined to ever take her back, so yes, you can help.”
“So, when does this plan of yours begin?”
Rachel stood and placed her arms around Hearn’s neck.
“I’ve already planted the first seed.”
***
Nico ran a hand through his hair as he looked at himself in the mirror. The man that looked back was barely recognizable.
His long silken hair was dull and half its normal length, having only eight months to grow back after the operation to remove the .32 slug that had penetrated his skull. He was skinnier than he’d been in years and looked as if he aged a decade, but at least he was alive.
He had no memory of the shooting, and couldn’t believe that he had nearly been turned into worm food by a ninety-nine-year-old man. He scowled, while thinking that if the old bastard hadn’t died of a heart attack that he would have killed him.
A lot had changed during the eight months he was in the coma. One of his girlfriends had moved away, taking his daughter with her, and he had no idea where she had gone. The mother of his other daughter had taken up with the man who owned the bodega in her neighborhood, a huge man who was an ex-wrestler. She was six months pregnant with the man’s child and said he treated her better than Nico ever had.
Learning of the death of his son’s mother shook him. Of the three women he had impregnated, she was the only one he ever had feelings for. She had overdosed on heroin, and his son was now in foster care.
It seemed to Nico as if the whole world had changed while he slept. Dos, the leader of a gang called Muerte Soldados or Death Soldiers, had been murdered by a rival gang, and the Muerte Soldados were no more, as their territory had been swallowed up.
Nico had grown up in that gang and the loss of it hurt deeply. It had been the closet thing he had to a family.
He limped back over to the chair in his cheap motel room, his left side noticeably weaker than his right. While in the hospital, he had heard the nurses talking about the re-opening of Taggart’s, and Timothy Hearn didn’t know it yet, but he was soon getting a new partner.
He picked up a five-pound dumbbell and began strengthening his left arm. Five pounds was pathetic, but even it was a strain. The bullet to the right side of his brain had rendered the left side of his body nearly unresponsive, and the months in bed had withered the rest of him.
They had given him a cane at the hospital, but Nico hated it, and preferred to walk with a limp, even though it left him looking more infirmed than the cane would have.
Someone knocked on the door. He placed the dumbbell out of sight at the side of the chair and looked through the peephole.
When he remembered who it was he was looking at, he smiled.
They never forget.
He opened the door and stared at the woman. She was good-looking, black, but her skin was so light that at their first meeting Nico had thought she was Hispanic. He knew who she was, but gazed at her in confusion anyway. The doctors must have told her that his memory was still foggy from his injury, and so he acted as if he couldn’t place her.
“Who are you?”
“Mr. Umbria, my name is Detective Knight; do you remember me, sir?”
Nico shook his head.
“I remember a big guy with dark hair, but I don’t remember his name.”
“His name was Detective Parker, he’s my partner. May I come in, sir?”
Nico let her in and waited, normally he liked sparring with cops, but he really was not himself and didn’t trust what he might say.
“We questioned you in connection with the murder of Charles Woolley.”
“Woolley?”
“Yes sir,”
Nico shrugged. The doctors told him that he could expect not to remember much of his recent past, and Woolley was a good part of his past to forget.
“I don’t remember him, but I really don’t remember much of anything that happened around the time I was injured.”
“I see.” Knight said, and Nico could tell that she was suspicious.
Nico lay on the bed and rested his head against the pillow.
“I need to sleep; can we talk some other time?”
Knight smiled at him.
“Oh we definitely will, get better Mr. Umbria,”
Nico watched her go, liking her rear nearly as much as her front. He closed his eyes and mumbled.
“Oh, I’ll get better, count on
it, cop,”
***
Rachel walked over to the bar as Heather was picking up a drink order, and Heather saw that she was fiddling with one of the silver barrettes in her hair.
“Jerry, I’m going out for a while, and I may not be back before closing,”
“Yes ma’am, we’ll handle things,”
Rachel turned to stare at Heather, a smile playing on her lips.
Heather looked back at her. “Can I help you, Mrs. Hearn?”
“No.”
“All right... um, Jerry I need a Sea Breeze and a Kamikaze.”
“Coming up,”
Rachel took out her cell phone and paused by the door. When Heather finished delivering her drink order to the table, she saw that Rachel was still watching her, but now she also seemed to be discussing her with whoever was on the other end of the phone, and finding it all amusing as she laughed in a giggle. Just as Heather disappeared into the kitchen to pick up an order, she heard Rachel utter the words, “...absolutely clueless....”
When she came back out to the bar with her order, she saw that Rachel was gone, but she thought about what had just happened long after she left.
4
For the second time that day, Heather found herself called to the office; however, this time the request came from Mr. Hearn.
After knocking and being told to enter, Hearn walked over and shut the door.
“Hello Heather,”
“Mr. Hearn,”
“Why don’t we sit on the sofa and talk?”
Hearn sat down and Heather took a seat on his right. He was staring at her chest, as he always did, and she could smell a strong scent of liquor on his breath.
“You wanted to see me?”
Hearn smiled. “Who wouldn’t, you’re very beautiful,”
“Um, Mr. Hearn, I probably should be getting back out to the bar.”
“My wife went out earlier; do you know where she went?”
“No sir.”
“I do, and it’s not the first time she’s gone there.”
“Gone where?”
“Your boyfriend’s house,”
Heather shook her head.
“Rick isn’t sleeping with your wife.”
Hearn took a long swallow from a glass containing amber fluid; he then looked at Heather and shrugged.
“Maybe they just watch TV, but I doubt it.”
“I just spoke to Rick. He was alone.”
He reached into a side pocket and pulled out a money clip. After peeling off a hundred-dollar bill, he laid it atop her thigh.
“What will that buy me?”
Heather blinked rapidly. “Excuse me?”
Hearn laughed.
“You’ve got me wrong; I never pay for it. I was just attempting to compensate you for the money you’ll lose in tips by going home early.”
“You want me to leave early?”
“Go see for yourself, I’m sure she’s still there.”
Heather tossed the money on the coffee table.
“I should be getting back to work.”
“Suit yourself, but your eyes will be opened someday,”
Heather left the office and walked through the busy kitchen. When she reached the bar area, she told Jerry that she was taking a bathroom break, and then headed into the restroom, where she sat in a stall. She took out her phone to call Parker, but then put it away. They had spoken right before she’d been called to the office and she knew that he was home by himself.
As she sat there, she remembered Rachel’s sly little smile, and doubt began to creep into her mind.
***
Parker opened his front door and found Rachel standing there.
He had been in his basement workshop in the middle of a project when he saw the lights flicker. He had the basement lights connected to the doorbell in such a way that caused them to flicker whenever a visitor rang the doorbell.
Rachel reached over and brushed sawdust from his T-shirt.
“Hi Rick,”
“Rachel, is everything all right at the bar?”
“There’s no trouble, not yet, but that is why I’ve come to talk to you.”
“What do you mean?”
“Can I come in?”
Parker stepped aside and let her in. Rachel looked around and noticed the changes. She pointed at the floor.
“That’s a nice rug, did Heather pick that out?”
“Yes she did,”
She walked into the living room.
“You’ve painted, and such a feminine color, I take it that is also a change made by Heather?”
“What do you want, Rachel?”
“A drink of water would be nice for starters, and then we’ll talk.”
Parker sighed as he headed toward the kitchen.
“I’ll be right back.”
When he had disappeared from sight, Rachel reached into her purse and took out a pair of red, silk panties. She tucked them and one of her silver barrettes on the side of a sofa cushion, the left side, because she knew that Parker habitually sat on the right.
When Parker reentered the room, she was at the mantle, staring at a picture of him with Heather.
“Here’s your water, now why are you here?”
“I’m worried. Your partner called earlier and asked us about Nico Umbria, until she called, Tim and I thought he was still in a coma.”
“Why would you be worried about Nico Umbria? As I recall, he and your husband were friends, the type of friends that alibi each other.”
“Don’t be cruel, Rick, I’m really worried, what if Nico blames Tim for what happened to him?”
“If Nico threatens you or Hearn then call Jo, my partner is working that case, not me.”
Rachel moved closer.
“Don’t you care what happens to me? You know I still care about you.”
“Of course I don’t want to see you get hurt, but there’s no point in getting upset now, from what my partner told me on the phone, Nico Umbria is still recovering from the shooting.”
Rachel touched his cheek.
“Do you ever miss me, just a little?”
“Stop! Nothing is going to happen. You know I’m not the type to cheat and you have a husband at home waiting for you.”
“How do you know that?”
“How do I know what?”
“That you’re not the type to cheat. Are you telling me that if young Heather had come on to you while we were married, that you wouldn’t have bedded her?”
Parker considered the question seriously.
“I would have resisted the temptation. Other women approached me when we were married, and I always came home to you. I only wish you had taken our vows as seriously as I did.”
“That’s bullshit. I see the way you look at that girl. You have a thing for her that’s more than sex. What is it about her, Rick; does she make you feel young again?”
“You wouldn’t understand,”
Rachel pressed herself against him as her hand went to his crotch.
“Take me upstairs and I’ll make you feel like a teenager.”
He pushed her away and then stared at her.
“What is your problem? Does it bother you that much that I’m happier without you than I was with you?”
“That’s a lie!”
“No Rachel, it’s not a lie, and I don’t want to hurt you, but I’m sick of these little attempts of yours to drag me down to your level. If I did cheat on Heather with you, it wouldn’t make what you did all right, it would only make me wrong. Now, why don’t you go home, hmm?”
Rachel looked him up and down as her eyes narrowed in rage.
“You and that ginger bitch won’t last, you know that.”
“I pray you’re wrong, now c’mon, let me walk you to the door.”
“I know where the damn door is, Rick. I lived here for years, remember?”
She stormed out, and Parker watched her go, while thinking once again that Heather needed to find a new job.
5
Heather stepped out of her car and looked around for Rachel’s red Mercedes.
When she didn’t see it, she felt relieved, but also felt foolish for looking for it, but then, she felt foolish for even being at Parker’s house in the first place.
It was after two a.m. and she had just gotten off work at the bar. She should be parking in her own driveway, but instead she let Hearn’s words eat at her until she began to doubt what she knew to be true, that Rick Parker loved her, and that he would never betray her.
Not only should she be home, but she should also be calling Parker to let him know that she had gotten home safely. It was a habit he insisted on, no matter how late she worked or how early he had to rise the next day.
Would a man be so concerned about her and yet toss away everything they had for casual sex?
No.
But, what if it wasn’t casual? He had loved Rachel enough to marry her, had married her and built a life with her. Maybe a part of him found her irresistible. Maybe he wanted her back.
She drove home. Once she entered the house, she went to the kitchen, sat at the table, and called Parker. He answered on the third ring with a sleep-filled voice.
“Heather?”
“It’s me, I’m home safe,”
“Great,”
“Rick?”
She heard a yawn, and then the word, “Yes?”
“I love you.”
“I love you too.”
She said nothing after that and so Parker spoke.
“Heather, are you still there?”
“Yes, I’m sorry, I guess I’m tired.”
“Me too, and I didn’t get to bed until after midnight.”
“What were you doing?”
“Woodworking in the basement, I’m making that vanity table you wanted.”
“Oh good, but were you really working all night?”
“Yeah, and I got a lot done too, I should have it finished by next week.”
“I see.”
“Oh yeah, Rachel stopped by. It seems she and Hearn found out that Nico Umbria came out of his coma.”
“That doesn’t explain why she was there.”
“She... nevermind, it doesn’t matter,”
“Does she come by a lot?”
“No, and I doubt she’ll be back.”
“Um hmm,”
“Is everything all right? You sound funny,”
Game Over! (Parker & Knight Book 3) Page 2