She scrolled through the list of calls. Curious, she thought. The 575 area code is Taos. She didn’t recognize the number. Alexia pulled into Imo’s Country Store to fill up at their pumps, and Myra took the opportunity of Alexia being in the store to return the calls.
“Detective Ramirez.”
Taos PD? Detective? Myra replied, “This is Myra Mitchell, Detective. I’ve been out of cell service and just now got your messages.”
Myra sat there stonily as he described events at the Luhan House that had taken place just two hours earlier. Diana was in surgery and the monster that hurt Diana was after her, Myra. Who? Why? Nothing computed. This made no sense. She had no enemies. Well, none at that violent level anyway. Myra couldn’t wrap her mind around any feasible plot line that could come close to explaining this. Maybe she was hallucinating in the heat. She thanked the detective and hung up as Alexia returned to the car.
“You okay?”
Alexia’s voice sounded distant, like Samuel’s had at the restaurant before she collapsed.
“Cliché or not, you actually look ‘white as a ghost.’ Can I get you anything?”
Myra felt paralyzed. She couldn’t nod ‘yes’ or shake her head ‘no,’ but tears found their path of least resistance. She couldn’t think, but one concern emerged in her thoughts. Why had this man tracked her to the Luhan House? She looked at the cell phone in her hand.
“Give me your cell phone. Go inside and buy us a throw-away phone.”
Alexia gave up her cell phone and Myra made sure both phones were turned off. She would have preferred removing the batteries altogether but that required an engineering degree these days. That eliminates one method for tracking us, she thought. Her next thought – should she continue on to Eureka Springs?
Thirty-one
(Autumn, 1975)
**********
Betsy hadn’t awakened until a pounding on her door aroused her shortly after ten o’clock the next morning. Oni stood at her door, tapping a foot, her arms crossed, threatening to drag her down the hill to the gallery in her PJs. Knowing her friend might do just that, she promised to be there within the hour.
Now, at eleven-thirty, she stood in the middle of the Eureka Art Gallery staring at her personal vision of Adonis. His oil black hair laid swept back in waves across his head, while his bronzed skin stood in contrast to a brightly bleached white T-shirt that clung to tight abdominals he could have chiseled from granite himself. Glistening grey eyes seemed to penetrate her soul and his flawless smile illuminated the room. She felt breathless and speechless.
And immediately on guard. One bad marriage was enough. Still, lust tugged her along and she felt a dangerously passionate physical attraction to Nico Brunori. She had no intention of rushing into a new relationship. Yet, as Oni put it, over four years of abstinence no longer qualified as “rushing.”
“So, you’re ‘that cartoon lady’ I keep hearing about.”
“Yes, I’m Betsy.”
He took her extended hand and kissed it. She felt a warm flush rise to her face, and fill other body parts she had neglected for too long.
She tried to ignore Oni’s gestures behind him, but her antics broadened Betsy’s smile more than the kiss. In turn, Nico apparently read the smile as a positive sign and poured on the charm. He placed his arm around her shoulders and with a sweep of his other arm, led her toward his closest sculpture, a young boy in straw hat and overalls, sitting on a log with his cane pole dangling over a pool of rippled water.
She glanced around her. His work held amazing detail, but was not at all what she expected. According to Oni, he was second generation Italian, spoke four languages fluently, and trained at distinguished art academies on the East Coast, in France, and in Italy. She expected classically inspired nudes, couples in passionate embrace, virile hunters, and beautiful dancers. She did spot one dancer -- a freckled, young girl in pigtails, tutu sagging on her too-small frame, attempting a pirouette.
“Nico, your work is delightful.” She touched the bronze in front of her and traced the details with her fingers. “I, uh, I expected something more, well, classical. This is like Norman Rockwell in bronze. It’s wonderful the way it catches the core of Americana.”
“Thank you.” He guided her to a nearby table and poured her a glass of red wine.
She shook her head and put her hand out to stop him. “Thank you, but I don’t drink.”
“Aww, I personally brought these bottles from Italy, from my family’s vineyards there. I thought you would like it.”
His pout melted her resolve and she took the glass. With a nod of his head encouraging her, she took a sip. She’d had sweet wines during holiday dinners with Rod’s family and hadn’t cared much for them, but this wine had a dry cherry, lightly nutty taste. She looked at the squat bottle in its straw basket.
“Chianti Classico. My family is from the Florence region of Italy. Do you like it?”
“Actually, I do, but one glass will be enough. Thank you.”
Oni tapped Nico on the shoulder. A customer wished to meet the sculptor.
Betsy sipped her wine as she watched him interact with several customers. As more people entered the gallery, she became aware that he would be tied up for some time. She placed her empty glass on the table, walked up to Oni, and whispered, “He’s beautiful. What are you trying to do to me?”
Oni raised one eyebrow and looked her squarely in the eye. With a saucy tone of voice, she replied, “Simple, honey. Get you laid. What else?”
Betsy blushed. She’d been too busy to absorb the free love manner of the hippy movement. She wasn’t sure what she thought of casual sex. What would her mother have thought about it? That was a question she would never have answered. She didn’t want to think about what her pa would say. She didn’t want to think about him at all, nor Dewey Hastings. Gratefully, she rarely thought of either one and finally felt rid of their haunting presences.
“Tell Nico I enjoyed meeting him. I have to get home to work.”
Shortly after 6 p.m., Betsy descended from her loft with her stomach growling. She had started rummaging through her refrigerator when she heard a knocking, no, more of a pounding, like with someone’s foot, at her door.
“Nico!”
The man stood there with a grocery bag in one hand and two bottles of family Chianti in the other. Her response was equal portions of surprise and apprehension. Then thoughts of irritation at Oni flit through her mind. Oni knew better than to give out Betsy’s address.
“Buona sera. Io sono qui per cucinare si cena.”
“Huh?”
“I’m here to cook you dinner.”
She looked at him suspiciously. “Oni put you up to this, didn’t she?”
“Not at all. She only told me where you lived.”
She stood there, pondering what to do. Oni was correct in saying that four years was no longer rushing, but she had just met this man. That conversation lasted all of ten minutes. Why should she feel comfortable having him in her home, much less making dinner for her? Was she that lonely, that “hard up?” What was Oni thinking? And then she remembered Oni’s comment and realized no woman with Nico could ever be considered “hard up.”
“Can I come in? This is heavy and getting heavier with each minute. I walked all the way from the grocery, and climbing up the hill was no treat.”
She stepped back. She’d never had a man cook anything fancier than breakfast for her in her own kitchen. If nothing else, this would be novel. “Um, sure. Why not? Come on in.”
He stepped across the threshold, stopped, and raised his eyebrows. “Kitchen?”
“Oh. Right. That way.” She pointed in the direction he should go. “Through that door.”
Two hours later, following a delicious meal of Chicken Florentine, Betsy uncorked the second bottle of Chianti and poured two more glasses of the dry, red wine. Nico eased up behind her and wrapped his arms around her, kissing her neck. She took a gulp of wine and set down her glass
before turning into his embrace. Her inhibition gone, she realized Oni’s goal was about to be fulfilled.
Betsy spent the next year questioning every move, every minute spent with Nico. He had proven himself an amazing lover, once Betsy moved past her inhibitions. His immediate family had visited several times and an Italian aunt and uncle had come to town on one occasion. She’d never witnessed such familial love, such passion. Every meal was like a party. Even their arguments, while fervent, brought ebullient resolutions. She loved the image of the joyful Italian family played out before her.
Yet, the adage, “Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me,” played over and over in her mind. She paid close attention to Nico and saw no beacons warning her of abusive shores or alcoholic gales. And his art was successful. He had no need for her money. He was tender and understanding. More so than she ever thought a man could be. She saw that as the artist within – sensitive, accepting, wistful.
He wore her down. Or had she fallen to a ticking biological clock? She was now twenty-six and her dreams for a family beckoned with increasing urgency.
Pre-dawn over the Ozarks sparkled with the promise of a wonderful spring day. Oni finished fixing Betsy’s hair with flowers and helped her adjust the Grecian inspired, off-white gown that flowed as Betsy walked. A warm southwesterly breeze rushed through the window and made the petals flutter.
“You’re beautiful.”
Betsy’s gut fluttered, too. Was she doing the right thing?
“C’mon. The limo’s outside.”
Fifteen minutes later, with Tammie and Angela, they turned off Highway 23 onto the drive to Pond Mountain. Nico and Chance would be there by now, along with a coterie of local and distant guests.
The limo pulled up to the end of the drive and stopped, but only Tammie, Angela, and, finally, Oni emerged from the vehicle. Oni took command and soon the guests clustered along two sides of a pine needle path heading toward the pond and its dock with a gazebo at the end. Betsy watched all this from the limousine and blinked twice, mouth open, when she saw Jacob Meyer emerge from the crowd, approach her door, and open it. More than her mentor, he’d been the father she’d never had, supportive and loving despite her failed relationship with his son. If he had RSVP’d to her invitation, Oni had kept it a secret, a surprise to her.
“Wow! You’re more beautiful than ever.” He extended his hand. “If you’ll let me, I’d like to give you away.”
Tears flowed from Betsy’s eyes and she grabbed a tissue to dab them. She nodded. “That would make me very happy,” she managed to say. His blessing on this day meant more to her than she could begin to describe.
As the sun rose above the horizon, she stepped out of the limousine and straightened her gown – and her resolve. A classical string quartet of cello, viola and two violins began to play. She looked down the path to see Nico under the gazebo with his younger brother and Chance as witnesses. The birds began to chirp their welcome to the new day. She noticed her first butterfly of the spring, a cabbage white, as it fluttered along the path ahead of her. Tammie, Angela, and Oni preceded her. Twenty minutes later, she had taken the plunge.
(Spring, 1981)
The tenth anniversary of “Sweetie and George” put Betsy in a reflective mood. Never in her most imaginative dreams had she ever foreseen the success she now enjoyed. Her childhood in poverty with an alcoholic father. The loss of her son. Her escape from the hills of western North Carolina that landed her in a brothel where two young women were brutally murdered. Those first few months trying to eke out a living as a freelance greeting card writer. A failed marriage. Building her dream with “Sweetie and George.” Traveling the world, first in the U.S., followed by international travel with her polyglot second husband. All had been fodder for her work, just as Oni had said.
As had her barrenness. After five years of marriage, she’d been unable to conceive. Nico never said it outright, but she knew he blamed her somehow. A growing friction had developed between them. Yet, her fertility specialist had found her fertile. He had discovered no physical obstacles and had laid it all on stress. Too many deadlines. Too much travel. She needed to take a year off to relax and fully enjoy the life she and Nico could easily afford. That year would start right after this celebration.
She looked out over a hall of people assembled in Monterey, California for the decennial of her creation. Banners of Sweetie and George along with their new dog, Roscoe, the Elvis fan, decorated the entrance and area behind the head table. Friends from Arkansas sat at nearby tables. Nico and Betsy sat at the head table along with her agent and the heads of King Features. Waiters removed empty dessert plates and silverware. Coffee carafes appeared on every table.
Betsy had already reaped her accolades and made her speech, mostly a succinct compilation of ‘thank yous.’ Now, the CEO of King Features spoke at the podium.
“And in closing, I’d like to present to you the latest ‘Sweetie and George’ book: a special, tenth anniversary edition of ‘The Best of Sweetie and George.’” He unveiled an enlarged copy of the cover sitting on the easel behind them. “And for everyone here tonight, we have advanced copies which Betsy has agreed to autograph.” He turned toward her. “That’s right, isn’t it?”
Betsy gulped in some air and nodded. She didn’t look forward to the task, which might take another hour or more, but it came with the territory. As the books were distributed, she arose and walked to a table set up for her signing. Nico caught up to her.
“I’m going back to the room to pack. Will I see you before I leave?”
He had to catch a red-eye flight back east for a gallery opening, while she still had business to attend to with King Features.
“I hope so. I’ll do my best to be quick.” She said that, but her hopes seemed dashed by the growing line of people in front of the table. They kissed and she sat down, watching Nico leave the banquet hall as the first person in line started gushing about how much she loved Sweetie.
Two hours later, knowing she’d missed Nico, she hunted down her agent.
“Chas, do I really have to attend these meetings? Can’t you handle this for me? You know I hate business meetings.”
He shook his head. “No can do. You need to be there tomorrow. After that, yeah, I can probably handle everything solo.”
She frowned and sighed.
“What’s up? You don’t usually shy away from these things.”
She glanced at the man who had helped turn her into a millionairess several times over. She didn’t really want to burden him with her personal concerns.
“I, uh … Our fifth anniversary was last week and between Nico’s late hours preparing for his gallery opening and this shindig, we never celebrated. I want to fly east and surprise him.” She’d begun to have other worries about Nico’s late hours, but she would not share those with anyone and certainly not Chas.
Two days later, she flew through Dallas to Little Rock and drove home. She had come home to repack for Nico’s showing in Florida. Driving down Eureka Street shortly after dusk, her heart accelerated when she saw lights on in their house, lights they had not left on timers when they departed for California.
She pulled up next to Tammie’s home and turned off the car, sitting and watching her home. Shadows flit across the curtains of their bedroom, and anxiety cemented itself in her heart. Maybe Nico had come home to repack as well. But, she had their car. How would he have gotten home from Little Rock? Maybe a burglar was ransacking her home. Maybe. She didn’t want to think of the other options.
She knocked on Tammie’s door, but no one answered and she remembered that Tammie had promised Angela a trip to Disneyland while in California. Betsy had preceded them home. Nervously, she found a piece of 2x4 for self-defense and crept toward her house. She quietly unlocked the back door and sneaked inside. Wine bottles, empty glasses, and dirty dishes lay scattered across the kitchen counters. She crept into the front room. It looked untouched. Her heart racing and her breathing
bordering on hyperventilation, she moved toward their bedroom and threw open the door, 2x4 raised and ready.
Nico was there, in bed. He was not alone.
Screaming in anger, she raced toward the bed already swinging the 2x4. She caught the other man in the butt with a major league connection.
“Get out! Get out of my house!” She prepared another swing as the man hastily gathered up his clothes, while trying to fend off her rage. As he ran from the room, she turned on Nico who’d already jumped out of bed. She caught him on the thigh with an off-balance swing. “You, too, you pervert! Get out! Get out! Get out! How dare you defile our bedroom like this! Don’t come back! Don’t you dare show your face to me ever again. Get out!”
She chased him down the steps and out the front door. On the way through the front room, she dropped the lumber and picked up a bust Nico had created of her. She threw it and narrowly missed him as he cleared the front porch.
In a frenzy, she ran back upstairs and gathered his clothes from the closet and his chest. She then collected his toiletries, shoes, framed photos and anything else of his she could find, and dumped them all in the middle of the room. She ran to the window and opened it. His belongings began to rain down upon the side yard, until the bedroom stood clear of any and all reminders of him.
Crying, Betsy sat on the edge of the bed and then quickly jumped back up. She stripped the bed of its linens and threw these out the window to join the pile on the ground. The thought of sleeping in that bed, even just touching it, now made her gag.
She walked downstairs and saw the empty glasses and dishes. They soon lay in a pile of shattered shards at the base of the closest wall. Emotionally spent, she plopped onto the couch and sobbed. Her dream of a family lay crushed with the fine china. How could she even consider showing her face in town after outing her cheating, queer husband like that? Her life in Eureka Springs was over.
Killer Reads: A Collection of the Best in Inspirational Suspense Page 77