“Roxann?” Angora called.
She replaced the picture, wiped her eyes, and returned to the bathroom. Angora was still in the bathtub. “Would you help me rinse my hair?”
Roxann had taken plenty of baths in that tub with no help rinsing her hair, but granted, Angora wasn’t used to making do, and she had about a hundred times as much hair as a normal person.
“Sure.” She used the cup that once held her toothbrush to capture warm water from the faucet and pour it over Angora’s bent head until the soap was gone. “Feeling better?”
Angora sat back, immersed to her shoulders. She looked younger and more delicate without makeup. “A little.”
“So this guy was the love of your life?”
Angora studied a clump of dissolving bubbles. “I thought so.”
She had that wild-eyed look again that made Roxann shiver. “Do you want me to call someone—your mother?”
“What time is it?”
“Around five-thirty.”
“Maybe later.”
Make them suffer a little longer. She couldn’t blame her. “Do you want to spend the night here? Dad’s at a fishing tournament, so we’ll have the place to ourselves.”
“I don’t have anyplace else to go.” She had regressed to a little-girl voice.
Roxann sat back on her heels. “You’ll have to face them sometime. Besides, this situation wasn’t your fault.”
“Yes, it was—I should’ve stood up to Mother when she wanted to invite that woman to my wedding.”
Blame everyone but the guilty. “And what would’ve happened two months from now when Trenton ran into his old girlfriend at the airport?”
“He wouldn’t have,” she said miserably. “We were moving to Chicago.”
“Really?”
“I was going to be an art agent for a big important firm.” She knuckled away a tear. “Now that’s all down the drain.”
Roxann frowned. “Why?”
“Well, because now I’m not moving.”
“Why not? Go without the goon.”
Her laugh was rueful. “Mother and Father would never allow me to move there alone.”
“So don’t ask them.”
Roxann knew that look—Angora had always struggled with her desire for independence versus the burden of being cut off from the goodies. Suddenly she brightened. “Maybe I can live with you.”
“Uh… I don’t think that’s such a good idea. You’d better get out of the water before you wither away. Besides, it’s my turn.”
Angora nodded and sat up. “I could really use that tea.”
Roxann shook her head as she rummaged for the least threadbare towel under the tiny vanity. “Sorry, I couldn’t find any tea. But help yourself to anything in the fridge that isn’t rancid. If you’re hungry, we could go out and get some dinner. Or I could order a pizza.”
Angora’s eyes lit up for just a second, then she patted her stomach. “I’d better not—I’m on a diet.”
“What kind of diet?” she asked suspiciously, remembering the harebrained gimmicks Angora had used to lose weight when they roomed together.
“It’s a food-combination plan.”
“What foods?”
“Um… popcorn and carrots.”
“Popcorn and carrots? Is that why your skin is the color of a pumpkin?”
“I think it looks nice.”
“Christ, Angora, you’re orange.”
She snatched the towel. “Could I please just have those clothes you promised?”
Roxann frowned, then went into the bedroom and unzipped the duffel bag. She fished around, wishing she’d taken more care when she’d packed her bag. The nicest thing she had to offer Angora was a pair of faded jeans and a tie-dyed T-shirt.
“You’re kidding, right?” Angora asked, looking over her shoulder.
“Sorry, I sort of packed in a hurry.”
She held up the T-shirt. “Good grief, when was the last time you went shopping?”
“For clothes?” Roxann pulled at the hem of her orange pullover self-consciously.
Angora sighed. “That’s a horrible color for you.”
She smirked. “Maybe I’ll start eating carrots.”
Angora picked up the bottle of pepper spray. “Is this what all the well-dressed women in Biloxi are wearing?”
Roxann grabbed the pepper spray before Angora could spray herself, “Just a precaution.”
Her cousin sighed. “I’ll never be able to get my butt into those jeans—don’t you have anything stretchy?”
“Just these.” Roxann held up a pair of red thong underwear.
“Now I know you’re kidding.”
Remembering Angora’s penchant for girdle granny panties, Roxann grinned. “They’re not so bad once you get used to them.” She left Angora studying the underwear, then ran her own bath. She stripped, indulged in a few seconds of envy over Angora’s curves next to her own boyish figure, then slid into the water up to her shoulders. A groan escaped her as the warm water caressed her calves, still tender from yesterday’s run. Unbidden, Capistrano’s face popped into her mind, his expression mocking as he perused her ugly shoes. Maybe she should have called him yesterday to report the breakin. Maybe he would have—
She scoffed. Maybe he would have helped her? Help her what? She couldn’t be sure that Frank Cape was looking for her. Besides, Detective Capistrano struck her as the kind of guy who would expect something in return—like the whereabouts of Melissa Cape.
No, the more she thought about it, the more she suspected that Elise had been behind the trashing of her place and leaving the bizarre message. Elise was a computer buff, and had spent hours on Roxann’s desktop, mostly surfing chat rooms. Which is where, Roxann believed, Elise had gotten the idea that her repeated failed relationships with men meant that she was gay. But if that was the case, Roxann thought wryly, most of the female population would be gay. Elise had always been wound tight, so Roxann suspected that the woman’s newfound gayness was justification for the things she perceived to be wrong in her life. And the breakin was probably retribution for Roxann’s not jumping on her bandwagon—from Elise’s stories, she knew the woman had done some pretty wacky things to men who had wronged her. The fact that Rescue would hire her was testament to their desperate need for staff.
Roxann inhaled deeply, then exhaled, relaxing her back and shoulder muscles. For now, she’d simply lie low for a few days, and maybe look for a new place when she got back to Biloxi. Although she really liked the color she’d painted her bedroom…
She must have dozed, because Angora’s voice startled her so badly she klonked her head against the unforgiving porcelain. “Ow!” She looked up to see Angora, wearing only the T-shirt and the tiny panties, holding a bottle of something. “What did you say?”
“Sorry. I said, look what I found. Tequila.”
Roxann winced, rubbing her head. “Don’t tell me you want to drink that stuff.”
“But I do.”
“Have you become a hard drinker since we last partied together?”
“I like margaritas.”
She laughed and pushed herself up, then reached for a skimpy towel. “It’s not the same.”
“Come on, I deserve a drink.”
“I won’t argue that point, but there’s truth to the adage about drinking tequila ‘to kill ya.’ You’ll have to mix it with something just to get it down.”
“I saw some tomato juice in the fridge.”
She grimaced. “If you’re determined.”
“You look great,” Angora said, nodding in the general direction of Roxann’s nudity.
“Uh, thanks… I guess.” A stupid flush climbed her neck as she tucked the ends of the towel between her breasts.
“You were always so nice and thin.”
“You were the one with the great figure.”
“Great figure? I’m considering swallowing a tapeworm to get rid of these extra pounds.”
“You’re letting
Dee get to you. I’m ordering pizza and we’re going to enjoy it.” If she could find a pizza parlor that would deliver to this neighborhood. “How are those thongs?”
Angora frowned. “Invasive.”
Roxann laughed, padded into the bedroom, and picked through the hodgepodge of clothing spread out on the yellow comforter. She stepped into underwear and a pair of denim shorts, and pulled on a pink tank top.
“Can I borrow a horsehair brush?” Angora asked, running her fingers through her nearly dry golden hair. “I can’t afford to get split ends.”
“There should be a brush in here,” Roxann said, opening the top drawer of the bureau. “But I can’t promise horsehair.” She rummaged through miscellaneous items that resurrected memories: key chains, dog-eared paperbacks, her name badge from the dress shop where she’d worked during high school, her Notre Dame tassel. Why hadn’t she taken it with her when she left home?
Why, indeed.
“Our Magic 8 Ball!” Angora lifted the vintage toy—a pajama powwow prop—from the clutter with a squeal. “Wonder if it still works?” She placed her hands on the ball and closed her eyes. “Am I a big loser jilted bride?” She opened her eyes and consulted the “magic” window. ” ‘Yes, definitely.’ ” She looked up. “It still works.”
Roxann laughed, relieved to see her cousin’s sense of humor returning. “If memory serves, the thing is broken—it only says ‘Yes, definitely.’ “
“Is this a college annual?” Angora asked, removing a bound book embossed with “1992.” She squealed again, and Roxann was reminded of her cousin’s annoying habit of squealing. Angora’s split ends were forgotten in her glee to locate her picture. “Here I am. Oh, that jacket is dreadful, isn’t it?”
Roxann looked over her shoulder. “Who can see the jacket for that big hair?”
“Okay, let’s see your picture, smartie.” She flipped back to the Bs, then frowned. ” ‘No picture available.’ “
Roxann grinned. “Sorry to disappoint.”
Then from the pages of the annual, an envelope fell and twirled to the floor. A memory chord stirred as Roxann bent to retrieve it.
“A love letter?” Angora teased.
“Yeah, right.” Neither she nor Carl had dared to write down their feelings for each other.
“Open it.”
She slid her finger under the envelope flap, and pulled out several sheets of yellow legal-pad paper. When she unfolded them, she was swept back through a time tunnel. “You won’t believe this.”
“What?”
Roxann held up the sheets for her to see the writing on the top of the pages: my life list.
“Our life lists?” Angora murmured. “Omigod.”
Oh my God was right. What more torturous exercise to face during an early-life crisis than to be reminded of all the things you’d planned to accomplish at the ripe old age of eighteen? “Let’s break open that tequila.”
Chapter 8
Roxann decided that tomato juice and tequila was quite possibly the most noxious combination of liquids ever concocted. Thank goodness the pepperoni pizza overrode the taste. “Do you remember what we were doing the night we made our life lists?”
Angora tucked her legs beneath her on the comforter Indian-style and pulled the T-shirt down over her knees. She was wearing her tiara, and her eyes were already bright from only half a glass of the “tequato” juice. “I was smoking my first and only joint.” Angora leaned closer. “I don’t suppose you have any marijuana on you right now?”
Roxann cracked a wry smile. “Uh, no. Sorry to tell you this, Angora, but I grew up. Besides, you were sick for a week after you smoked that joint.”
“I don’t remember that.”
A convenient trait of Angora’s—selective amnesia to go along with her penchant for embellishing the things she did remember. “I suppose you don’t remember where we’d been the night we made our lists?”
“No.”
Roxann studied her cousin’s face, wondering how much of their college experience Angora had managed to block out. Roxann had thought her cousin would be thrilled to be away from Dee, but instead she had suffered from bouts of depression and homesickness, even anxiety attacks. Four torturous years. “We were at a memorial service for that girl who was run down in front of the Science Building.”
Angora bit into her lip. “Tammy Paulen.”
“Right,” Roxann said, turning to the senior class where she skimmed the thumbnail black-and-white photos. “Here she is—Tammy Renee Paulen, philosophy major.” On the page, Tammy was an attractive blonde with a wide smile, frozen in time in a big shoulder-padded blouse and permed hair. When she’d posed for the picture, Tammy probably couldn’t have imagined she wouldn’t live to graduate.
Steeped in melancholy, Roxann leaned against the headboard with a denim pillow at her back. “Tammy was in one of my classes. I remember walking by her empty seat for the rest of the semester. It was so weird. Didn’t you know her?”
“No,” Angora said, then took another drink from her glass.
“It says here she was a member of Delta Zeta.” Angora’s sorority.
She shrugged. “I knew who she was, but I didn’t know her. Seniors didn’t associate with freshmen.”
Angling her head, Roxann said, “I thought you saw her the night she was killed.”
Her cousin pulled back, then lifted her shoulders in a slow shrug. “Maybe. My memory is fuzzy.”
Roxann turned back to the girl’s photo, wondering what Tammy Renee Paulen would have done with her life if she’d been given the chance. Something better than separating dysfunctional families? “They never found out who did it, did they?”
“A couple of students were questioned… I think.”
“The memorial service was so sad.”
“Her mother wore a green suit,” Angora said, nodding.
More details crowded Roxann’s mind, too. Red-eyed students. Skittish university officials. Frightened gossip. Angora’s ashen face…
Angora had been especially upset when someone had whispered that Tammy’s injuries prevented an open-casket viewing. So upset, in fact, that they had left the service early. Back in their dorm room, Roxann had offered Angora a hit from a joint to help her calm down. The scene came flooding back so strongly, Roxann’s nostrils twitched. “We were smoking and started talking about what we wanted to do with the rest of our lives,” she recalled.
“And you suggested we make a list.” Angora smiled, seemingly relieved at the change in subject.
Roxann closed the annual, contrite for mentioning the troubling incident—she was supposed to be cheering up her just-jilted cousin.
Angora rifled through the sheets of paper lying on the bed between them. “But why do you have both lists?”
“I found them after you moved out.”
“Oh, right. Mother was sure you were corrupting me.”
“I was.”
Angora leaned in. “I have to ask—how was the Figure Eight?”
“Huh?”
“The Figure Eight. You know—The Joy of Sex and that long-haired poet?”
Roxann smiled. “Oh, yeah. I don’t remember that position specifically, although I did have a soft spot for the Modified Spoon.”
Angora sighed dramatically. “God, I was so bored after I moved into the DZ house.”
The dizzy house, as it was known on campus. “You were involved in… things.”
“Nothing inspiring,” Angora said, tossing her glorious blond hair, which still hadn’t been brushed. “You were the one always making headlines in the campus paper.”
“I was going to change the world, all right.”
“So what do you do, exactly? Uncle Walt said you had a top-secret job.”
Roxann nodded. “And if I told you, I’d have to kill you.”
Angora’s eyes widened.
“I’m kidding.” She laughed at her cousin’s gullibility. “I help women who are in trouble.”
“Like me.”
Roxann smiled wryly. “Except the women I deal with are usually in danger of more than being jilted at the altar.”
“Everything’s relative,” Angora said with a sniff, then frowned into her glass before taking another drink. “But I always knew you’d do something good with your life.”
I’VE GOT YOUR NUMBER, YOU FAKE.
Roxann fidgeted and downed another mouthful of the drink. “Everyone has their own opinion of what’s good.”
“Was helping women on your life list?”
“I don’t think so, not specifically. I honestly can’t remember.”
“How many things are on your list?”
Roxann picked up the papers and flipped to the last page. “Thirty-five. You?”
“Thirty-six. What’s your number one?”
“Let’s see… ‘Backpack across Europe.’ “
“Have you?”
“Not yet.” Not on the meager salaries she commanded, and the tiny stipend she received from Rescue went straight into a money market account. She smoothed a finger over her double-faced travel watch. It was 1 a.m. in London. “But someday. What’s number one on your list?”
Angora grinned sheepishly. “To be Miss America.”
Of course.
“It could still happen,” she insisted.
“Don’t you have to be twenty-five or under?”
“Hey, I could squeak by, but you also have to be single. Oh, I forgot—I am single.” She misted up.
“You still have—what is it? The Miss Uptown Baton Rouge title?” The alcohol was bleeding through her limbs like menthol.
“Miss Northwestern Baton Rouge.”
“Oh. Well, with a big honking crown like that, I’ll let you count it.”
“Thanks.” Angora sniffled and put a mark on the page with an “RTC Electric” ink pen. “My number two is ‘Fly a plane.’ “
“Fly a plane?”
Angora shrugged. “Why not?”
“Because it’s a big hunk of metal that hurtles through the air.”
“Are you saying I’m not smart enough to learn how to fly a plane?”
Got Your Number Page 6