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The Husband Diet (A Romantic Comedy)

Page 26

by Barone, Nancy


  “Anywhere else he could be?” Julian asked me, and I shook my head.

  “Ira doesn’t have any friends. He spends all his time at his office.” With his secretary.

  When we were free to go, Julian took me down to Tech.Com, just north of the highway. There was only one car in the private parking lot—the janitor’s.

  “Where’s Mr. Lowenstein?” I demanded of him in my brisk business manner, to avoid falling apart.

  “He left a couple of hours ago,” the man shrugged as he continued to mop the floor, and I remembered when I used to clean Ira’s offices for him. And do his bookkeeping. “Where’s Maxine?”

  “You mean his wife, Mrs. Lowenstein? They left together.”

  I felt a tingling, odd sensation at the back of my head, like someone was creeping up from behind me. Julian glanced at me.

  “Why are you here so early?” I asked him. “It’s only four thirty.”

  Again he shrugged. “I’ve been coming at this time for a year. When everybody’s gone.”

  I felt the blood drain from my face as I tripped out of the office and into the parking lot to vomit on the tarmac. A year. They’d been together for a year. And instead of coming home to his family, he’d gone home with her. Spending at least eight hours per evening there. On top of the entire day. Ira didn’t have just a mistress. He had been leading a double life.

  Julian caught up with me and held my hair away from my face as I puked.

  “No—go away,” I sobbed, pushing him away, but he didn’t move.

  I straightened up and dashed my hand over my drenched eyes with a moan. A year. One whole year of sleeping with his secretary. No wonder he came back in the wee hours. No wonder he’d always left his dinners half-eaten. No wonder he’d built a barricade in our bed and avoided turning in for the night when I did. It was easier to pretend to be asleep, easier to use the same excuse every single night, or, as he had done, to give no excuse at all, besides the fact that I made him sick.

  “Think, Erica,” Julian said. “Where could they have gone? Where does she live?”

  “How the hell would I know?” I snapped.

  “Okay, what’s her surname?”

  I sighed heavily. Pristine Maxine. “Maxine Moore.”

  Julian’s face lit up as he pulled his cell phone out. “Wait—I think I still have her number from when she called me.” He dialed and waited. “Her phone’s off. Let me call Detective Peterson… Detective? Julian Foxham here. Can you please find out where his secretary, Maxine Moore, lives? Call me back? Okay, thank you.”

  His phone clicked shut. “I need some caffeine—let’s go.”

  * * *

  We stopped at Starbucks for a cup of coffee and something to eat, but for the first time in my life I couldn’t swallow a bite. Oh, Maddy! Where are you, baby? I looked down into my coffee cup, watching it swirl slowly as Julian stirred it for me.

  “I wish this was Ira’s blood,” I rasped, murderous feelings rising again. They had never left me, only subsided because of the shock. How could he do this to her?

  “All this time,” I groaned. “All this time he’s ignored his children to spend time with some homewrecker slut in stilettos and no panties.”

  Julian put his hand on mine, and I looked up into his eyes as his phone rang. He listened as he took money out of his wallet to pay. Then he clicked his phone shut.

  “He’s got her address,” he said and I shot to my feet.

  * * *

  Maxine Moore lived on the seventh floor of a new condo in a nice area overlooking the Harbor Islands. As expected, no one answered the door so the detective used the search warrant he’d obtained in record time, and pushed his way in. My heart was in my mouth as we rode up in the elevator, Julian opposite me. The detective and his men had taken the previous one. I looked up at him, and he squeezed my hand and kissed my forehead. He opened his mouth to say something, but the doors pinged open and we jumped out and into Maxine’s empty apartment, and I stupidly catapulted myself, calling Maddy’s name.

  The apartment echoed with its emptiness and I felt the walls closing in on me. I ran to the bathroom and hurled again. What the hell was wrong with me? Was I going bananas along with Ira? Would social services take the kids away from us both?

  After I’d finished and rinsed my face, I caught sight of a stack of baseball magazines on the side of the toilet and the bathtub. Old habits die hard.

  Hanging on the wall was a picture of her and Ira, happy and in love on a beach. She was wearing Ira’s New Jersey University shirt. I recognized it because it bore an ink stain I hadn’t been able to remove. So that was where it had gone.

  Steadying myself, I opened the medicine cabinet. There was a bottle of prescription vitamins, B9, to be exact—folacin, or folic acid. I had taken them as well. When I was pregnant.

  And then I saw a file on the bathroom counter. She must have forgotten it in her haste to leave. It was the complete file of her pregnancy. This was her first. She was eight months along.

  I sat down on the edge of the tub next to Ira’s magazines and held my head. Eight months! For eight months and more he hadn’t loved me. He had loved someone else. Fathered another child.

  On shaky legs I returned to the living room, where Julian was waiting for me. “Are you all right?” he asked.

  I shook my head and handed him the folder. He went pale as he read.

  I opened the front door to leave Maxine’s apartment, wanting to throw myself off her balcony instead.

  “Tell the detective to call his men off the airports. She won’t be flying,” I said over my shoulder on my way out, but he followed me into the corridor, where I did what I had become an expert at lately. Sink my face into Julian’s chest and bawl.

  Ira didn’t even love his own family, and he was starting another one? You can do that with your knitting, or a bad book because it’s not good enough to hold your interest, because it bores you. You can put it down and start something new. There’s nothing wrong with that. But you couldn’t put a family away in the drawer when you tired of it.

  “Mrs. Lowenstein?” came Detective Petersen’s voice.

  I turned to see him holding another file folder and beckoning us in again.

  “Were you aware of any family funds missing from your joint account?” he asked softly.

  I shook my head. “No.”

  Detective Petersen leafed through the folder he had found and nodded apologetically. “There’s a record here of one hundred thousand dollars paid by Mr. Lowenstein in person—as a down payment for this apartment.”

  And suddenly I remembered my sister-in-law Sandra, who went to the same gym as Maxine, telling me that she had moved into a nice condo. I remembered thinking, how the heck does a secretary manage to afford that? Shit. Mega-double shit. I had been such a blind idiot. The truth had been screaming at me in the face, and I just hadn’t understood. Ira had squandered most of his own earnings on her.

  I walked back to Julian’s jeep, not feeling my legs, as if I was drunk, not feeling my body, or seeing my surroundings, as if I was dead. Ira had stolen my money—money that my Nonna Silvia had made sacrifices to give to me for my future. Money which I had kept for my children’s college funds. Not only had he ruined my whole goddamn life, he’d taken from his children, which shouldn’t have surprised me. And yet I couldn’t believe the man I’d married had managed to hate me so much to do this to me. If I could have pushed a button to make him disappear from the face of the earth, I would’ve.

  Chapter 36:

  April Fools and Irises

  Maddy’s Minnie Mouse model, hanging from her bedroom ceiling, seemed to be suspended miles and miles above me. I had the sensation I was lying, stuck, at the bottom of the ocean, under a periscope that was focused on the Disney character. Minnie. Mickey. Goofy.
Maddy loved them all.

  “Minnie and Mickey Mouse,” I murmured with a smile as Julian’s face came into focus at the top of the periscope. He had come to bring me back to the surface. “Disneyworld…”

  “Poor thing,” I heard a familiar voice say. Marcy. “She thinks she’s a little girl again. She wants to go to Disneyworld.”

  “Bullshit,” came another familiar voice. Judy. “She’s always hated Disneyworld, Marcy, don’t you even remember?”

  “Disneyworld!” came Julian’s voice again as I heard him click his phone open. “Detective Petersen? Block all the roads to Florida! Erica thinks they may be headed for Disneyworld.”

  “Thank you,” I whispered, but it was already dark again.

  * * *

  I woke up to the sound of Maddy’s voice.

  Had I dreamed it? Or was she downstairs playing in the living room as usual? I jumped out of bed and flew down the stairs where my parents and Detective Petersen were watching a family video of Maddy’s sixth birthday party. I turned away, tears running down my cheeks as Julian was coming in through the open door.

  “Mom!” I heard, and whirled to see Warren as he catapulted himself into my arms and I clung to him desperately, wishing I could take his fears and pain away. Wishing I could dissolve his anger and hatred. They had never done me any good.

  “Warren, sweetheart!” I cried, nearly strangling him. “She’s okay, you’ll see.”

  “I know it,” he answered, his lips trembling. “Dad doesn’t hate her. Even if he doesn’t care. Right?”

  I hoped Ira cared for Maddy a lot more than he hated me. I nodded, and he threw his arms around me again.

  I glanced at Julian. His eyes were red and his face had the shadow of a beard. How much time had elapsed since Maddy had gone? How many hours had she been begging Ira to take her back home? Did Maxine have the sense to take care of her properly? Oh, God, I didn’t even want to think of what I’d do when I got my hands on both of them. Death wasn’t enough. I had something more twisted in mind, like re-enacting all my murderous dreams on him—all at the same time.

  “Get some sleep, Julian,” I said, bringing myself back from my murderous thoughts. “Don’t worry about me. I’m going to be sitting on the phone until the damn thing rings.”

  But instead Julian produced a box of muffins and coffee from Starbucks. “Eat. You need to keep your sugar levels up.”

  He was the only man who had ever said that to me. Marcy actually had the gall to gasp and say, “Why don’t I just get you some yoghurt or something?”

  Julian turned and incinerated her with a look that was worse than my evil eye, and she stepped back. If I hadn’t been so terrified for Maddy I would have laughed. Old Marcy had finally found a man who didn’t succumb to her charms.

  As I was upstairs getting dressed, Julian’s cell phone rang.

  “Erica!” he called, flying up the stairs. On the landing he grabbed my arms. “It’s Maxine! She’s called the police and Ira’s under their custody. Maddy’s with her and they’re on their way over with a squad car!” I covered my mouth with my hands—my baby was coming home!

  When she came in through the door, whimpering “Mommy, Mommy!” I couldn’t keep my tears back any longer, clawing at her, squeezing her so tight I thought I’d break her.

  “Baby!” was all I could say over and over for the first few minutes, then I cleared her face of her pretty reddish-blonde curls and whispered, “It’s all right, Maddy. Mommy’s here and I’m never going to let anything happen to you, okay?”

  She nodded fiercely and threw her little arms around me again. “Maxine bought me some toys. She said she was going to take me home because Daddy was mad again.”

  Warren threw himself at us, and I caught a glimpse of Maxine in the corner, talking to some police agents. Her stomach was incredibly huge now.

  Julian watched us, his eyes shiny and red. Maddy looked up, noticing him.

  “Hey, sweetie pie,” he whispered and she flew into his arms, burying her face into his stomach as he bent to kiss the top of her head, whispering comforting words to her. He lifted her and she rested her head against his, just happy to be there.

  “I’m glad Maxine didn’t forget your number after all,” I muttered, wiping my eyes.

  Maxine whispered, “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know he’d abducted her. He said you and Julian were going away somewhere. He said you were on better terms now and—”

  “It’s okay, Maxine. Really.” I nodded at her, indicating the sofa for her to sit down. I wasn’t angry at her anymore. I was just grateful she had brought my daughter back to me before Ira became dangerous again.

  “I don’t know what happened to him,” she sniffed as she slowly lowered herself next to me. “One minute he was fine, and the next—he just lost it because we had to go to the bathroom. Only then did I realize it was dangerous for us to stay with him. So I locked Maddy and myself up in the bathroom at a gas station and called the police.”

  “You saved my baby’s life. Thank you,” I whispered, wondering how I could ever repay her.

  * * *

  “I need to speak to him,” I said to the detective as Ira was ushered into a private office, paler, scrawnier and skinnier than he’d ever been. There was a strange light in his eyes that I didn’t recognize and it scared me. The Ira I knew, I could handle. This Ira was someone I’d never seen before.

  “Yes, ma’am. There will be an officer in there with you at all times for your safety.”

  “Do you want me to come in with you?” Julian asked softly.

  “I can do it, thanks.”

  He nodded and whispered, “That’s my girl.”

  I smiled wanly and sat in the chair facing the bulletproof glass. But it sure wasn’t hatred-proof. I hated him so much I was trembling, but I had something to say to him.

  “I’m glad you’re finally out of our life. Don’t ever look for us. The answer will always be no,” I informed him and turned on my heel.

  Tuscany. I could almost see it.

  * * *

  That night, after my family had come and quickly gone, as they always did when I was in trouble, I turned to Julian as he was climbing into his jacket.

  “Julian, I don’t want you to have to leave every night.”

  As a response, he took my face in his hands and bent to kiss me on the lips. “It’s not an April Fool’s joke, is it?” he asked. “Are you serious?”

  Julian drew me into the circle of his arms and hooked his thumbs into the belt around my jeans. “I’d be the fool to let you go,” I murmured as he lowered his delicious mouth to mine. “I love you,” I finally whispered and it felt like going home.

  * * *

  I was spending more and more time with Julian at his home teaching him to cook. Well, not only. I imparted instructions and information, underlining the importance of using genuine Italian ingredients such as pure Tuscan olive oil, meats and wine. He diligently obeyed, having no idea I was doing a real Italian job on him. It was working like a charm, because once the stuff had been put in the oven, he lost all concept of propriety and spread me on top of his island to kiss the hell out of me and engage in some pretty impressive preliminaries.

  Today we were doing Tortino al formaggio, which was basically a cheese and ham pie. But not just any ham or cheese. I’d swung by Italian Gifts and picked up some fresh Parmigiano Reggiano cheese and Prosciutto di Parma ham, some Calabrian onions (small but potent) and some Panna da Cucina Parmalat, Italian cooking cream. Yum-yum.

  Julian pulled me to him to sneak a kiss. First they were clean, perfunctory kisses on my lips, but soon they became deeper, needier.

  “Oh, wow...” he drawled into my ear, his teeth nibbling on my earlobes and my throat, making me shake. “You smell so good. I want to take you upstairs and taste you
ever so slowly...”

  I was too excited to answer; my brain was short-circuiting at the idea of having him in my bed again.

  * * *

  At work, things were always hectic, just the way I liked it. And sometimes you even got little satisfactions. Mr. Simmons, a very annoying guest whom I’d handled brilliantly, turned out to be the owner of a rival hotel in New England, The Pilgrim. He’d offered me a position over at his chain and I realized that his increasing difficulty as a guest had simply been him running me through his tests. Apparently I’d passed with flying colors. I was flattered, but politely refused. Soon I was going to be in Italy, if I had any say in it.

  And... I had managed it. My irises were finally starting to bloom in my now beautiful garden. Swallows began to circle the yard out back, diving to catch any insect stupid enough to hang around. I leaned out the window, my elbows on the sill, and sighed with what I believe was contentment after a very long time. I’d been right. It had been an endless winter. I thought about all that had happened to us this past winter. If I’d survived it, I’d survive anything in the future.

  Chapter 37:

  Truth is Freedom

  The next day I got a call from my Aunt Monica to stop by at Le Tre Donne. “Hello?” I called out to the empty dining hall. “Zia Maria? Martina? Monica?”

  Silence, and then a burst from the kitchen and three happy women bearing gifts. Never trust three happy Italian women bearing gifts.

  “Vieni qui, Erica, come and sit down. We have something for you,” said Zia Maria as the other two huddled around her, their faces red with excitement.

  “What’s up? Why is the shop closed?” The last time one of my family closed a shop was when Nonna had died. I bolted to my feet again. “Is someone ill?”

  “Zitta, zitta!” They silenced me, looking around. Zia Monica locked the door and pulled down the blinds. “Everything is fine.”

  “So why do I feel like we’re in a mob movie and I’m going to get a half-moon stuck in my throat?” I chuckled. Sometimes they could be so dramatic it was sweet.

 

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