Divorced, Desperate and Deceived

by Christie Craig

  She yanked her hand away so fast he glanced at her. “Cramp,” she lied, and shook her hand.

  Foster closed his phone and stared directly into Joey’s eyes. Joey had stopped listening to the conversation, and now he wondered if his lack of attention had been a mistake. Had Foster gotten wind of the pregnant blonde Joey had told to hide in the closet?

  “What?” Foster asked, just before the same question slipped from Joey’s lips.

  Joey shrugged.

  “You were smiling,” Foster accused.

  “Oh.” Hell yeah, he’d been smiling. The redhead had gotten the message and left the diner. “Since when is smiling a crime?”

  “It makes you look like an idiot,” Foster said.

  Damn, Joey really didn’t like this guy. He almost said as much; but then, Foster seemed the kind of jerk who’d take pleasure in knowing it, so Joey kept his dislike to himself. For now at least.

  But later? Later, if Foster proved to be a threat to the redhead, that might be a different story. Foster would know exactly what Joey thought about him.

  He picked up his burger, took a hearty bite, chewed and swallowed. “I’d say smiling makes me look happy.” And he was. He was practically blissful. Hell, luck—or was it the Higher Power—had decided to shine on him.

  Or, more than likely, fate had decided to shine on the redhead. Joey wasn’t sure his ass was worth any shining. Not that his self-worth or lack of it mattered right now. He was just thrilled he’d done something right. While he knew his job was far from over, getting that mother out of the cafe without Foster seeing her was practically a miracle. And yeah, that made him want to smile.

  Strangely enough, he’d been feeling happy since he’d laid eyes on Lola. But thinking about Lola and looking at Foster put an end to his good feelings.

  The waitress dropped off Foster’s hamburger. The man practically growled at her, but she seemed immune to his sour attitude.

  “Thank you,” Joey said, when Foster didn’t. He might not be big on talking, but common courtesies he managed. The waitress smiled at him and left as quickly as she’d dropped off the plate.

  “That was Lorenzo on the phone,” Foster remarked. “Boss said for you to take care of Donald, but…” He paused. “He wants a finger. For proof.”

  Disgust hit Joey, and he dropped his burger. He’d give Lorenzo the finger, all right, just not one Lorenzo wanted. “Guess I’d better get going then.”

  “I guess you should,” Foster agreed, smiling as if he enjoyed Joey’s revulsion. “I’ll call you as soon as I have something. Get Donald out of the way—and make sure he doesn’t pop up anytime soon, if you know what I mean. We don’t need people looking into that right now.”

  “Prunes, sauerkraut, deviled ham, Fiber One cereal, pickled beets and pork-’n’-beans.” Kathy looked over her shoulder. Luke appeared to be checking the windows to see if they were locked, while Kathy had started to search for anything to fill the gaping holes in their bellies. She gazed again at the open pantry. “Who on God’s green earth eats this stuff?”

  Luke looked back and frowned. “She has digestive problems.”

  “Well, no wonder she has digestive problems if she…”

  Until that moment, Kathy hadn’t bothered asking who the tiny lakeside cabin belonged to. Or how Luke knew the key would be under the flowerpot on the side of the house.

  “Whose place is this?” she asked. Don’t let him say his landlady Claire. Please, don’t let him say—

  “Claire’s.”

  Kathy rolled her eyes and grabbed the cans of deviled ham and pork-’n’-beans out of the pantry and set them, none too gently, on a counter. Then, unable to help herself, she turned and let him have it with both barrels. “She has the key to your place. You know where her little love cabin is and where the hidden key is. You know all about her sensitive digestive system, and you still want me to believe that you two are just friends? Do you think I’m an idiot?”

  Luke held up his right index finger as if to make a point. “Believe me, if I had a choice not to hear about her digestive problems, I’d take it. I swear that’s half of what she ever talks about.”

  “And what is the other half? Whispered sweet nothings?”

  He pretended to shiver in repulsion. “You know, you obviously have a problem.”

  “I have a problem?” she shot back. “You’re sleeping with a woman who has to eat prunes and yet manages to down pork-’n’-beans!”

  His laugh filled the one-room cabin. And while she fought it, his reaction made her want to smile. She bit her lip. Then she wondered if her husband’s new wife ate prunes. God, she hoped so. And she hoped they gave her gas. She hoped right now the woman was pooting her way across Paris. It would serve both the woman and Tom right. Although she felt sorry for her son.

  “See, that’s what I mean.” Luke opened a cabinet door above the fridge and pulled out a toolbox, and Kathy watched his arm muscles flex. Yup, that shirt fit him well enough that it didn’t hide his physique.

  “What do you mean, that’s what you mean?” she asked.

  He set the toolbox on the small wooden two-person kitchen table and looked at her. “The fact that you don’t believe me when I tell you that I’m not involved with Claire.” He pulled out a pair of pliers, went to the kitchen window and twisted something on the lock. “Why don’t you believe me?”

  She arched a brow at him. “Because the proof is in the pudding. Or should I say ‘the prunes’?” She reached back and pulled out the appropriate bag.

  He smiled—the kind of smile that only appeared at the corners of his eyes. “Okay, correct me if I’m wrong, but you believe I’m with the FBI. You believe that I’m with WitSec.”

  “WitSec?”

  He sighed. “The Witness Protection Program. You believe that, right?”

  “Yeah.” She looked for an electric can opener, and when one wasn’t out, she started opening drawers. On her second try she found an old-fashioned, hand-crank kind.

  “So why do you insist on believing that I’m lying when I tell you I’m not sleeping with a woman twice my age? To me it seems that scenario is easier to believe than the others.”

  She pulled out the can opener. She knew exactly why she refused to believe him: Because she’d found it so hard to believe when Tom had taken her out to eat on what she’d thought would be a romantic evening, only to tell her he was in love with his secretary. His much older, dumpy secretary. Something that went against every movie or book ever made. How did that happen?

  “Why is that?” he repeated, pulling her out of her reverie.

  “Because it’s about sex. Men always lie about sex,” she rationalized. And there was some truth to her statement.

  “We do?” Luke asked.

  “Yup. You do.” She fought to get the can opener started in the can.

  Luke’s shoulder brushed hers as he pulled the device from her hands. He opened the beans. Then he handed over the can and dropped the opener back on the counter and asked, “Who says men always lie about sex?”

  “Cosmo, Redbook, and Complete Woman.” She looked around. “They all pretty much agree.” She looked around again. “I don’t suppose we have any bread, huh?”

  “No. But I think I saw some crackers in the fridge.”

  “Crackers in the fridge?” she asked.

  He held up his hands. “I didn’t put them there.”

  She opened the refrigerator, grabbed the Saltines, dropped them on the table and then dumped the beans into a bowl.

  As she looked around for a microwave, he cleared his throat to get her attention. “And you believe everything you read in those magazines?”

  “Not everything. I didn’t believe the article about how a woman could actually orgasm from sneezing. Not that sneezing doesn’t feel good, but…” She looked up and found him staring at her, smiling.

  “But you believe everything written about men involving sex.”

  “Pretty much,” she admitted, and m
ade a full circle, searching. “There’s no microwave?”

  He shrugged. “Claire doesn’t believe in them. She’s convinced that it’s radio waves causing her irritable bowel syndrome.” He snagged a pack of crackers, opened it, popped one in his mouth and groaned with pleasure. “Nothing like a good cracker. Almost as good as a sneeze.” He grinned.

  She studied him while she snatched a cracker of her own and savored it. Could he be telling the truth about Claire? She knelt and opened a few more cabinets until she found a pot suitable to heat the beans. While she was down there, Goodwill came bouncing over.

  “I’m going to feed you too, buddy,” she promised.

  Standing, she pointed the pot at Luke. “So if you’re not involved with Claire, how did you know about this place?”

  She poured the bowl of beans into the pot and turned on the stove. The gas outlet gave a few puffs and clicks, and then the flame burst to life. She turned down the heat. Beans weren’t her favorite, but with rations so low, burning them would be a felony. Right up there with stealing a car. She inwardly flinched and pushed those thoughts, along with the others, to the back of her mind.

  Luke leaned against the side of the fridge, munched on crackers and studied her as if mentally chewing on something also. She hoped like hell the puzzle he was trying to solve wasn’t her. Not that he would succeed—she hadn’t really figured herself out yet. Probably because that would mean she’d have to sift through the crap that life had tossed in her lap, starting with her father and then her ex. Why spend time sifting through crap when she’d gotten so good at ignoring it?

  “And how did you know where to find the key?” she added, opening the can of deviled ham. Crumbling some crackers on another plate, she added half the meat and set it down for Goodwill.

  When she rose, Luke was staring at her chest. She gave her green tank top a good upward yank, and he frowned. Then he seemed to process her question. “Claire had me come out and fix the leaky toilet. I’m a plumber, remember?” He continued to stare, but not at her chest. He stared at her eyes, as if trying to read her.

  That scrutiny annoyed her. She didn’t want him figuring her out. If she could ignore all her own crap, so should the rest of the world. “And here I thought you were a cop,” she muttered.

  “A federal agent,” he corrected, and crossed his arms over his chest. “And it’s not the same thing,” he cut her off.

  She couldn’t help it; she shot him a coy look. “What? Are your guns bigger than theirs?”

  He smiled in response. “You know what I think?”

  “That you need a bigger gun.”

  Happy with her retort, she turned and found the silverware drawer, retrieved a spoon to stir the pot. The slightly sweet smell of brown-sugar-seasoned beans followed steam up to her nose, and her stomach grumbled.

  “I think you’re scared. And I think you use humor to hide it.” He moved next to her. “I also think the reason you don’t believe me has something to do with some guy cheating on you, maybe with an older woman—and there was probably a cop involved.” He pushed a strand of hair from her cheek and studied her.

  He wasn’t one hundred percent right, but he was pretty darn close to all her dirty laundry. Too close to her crap.

  Almost as if he read the No Trespassing sign being nailed up in her mind, he leaned down and inhaled the steam rising from the beans. “I also think”—he looked up and met her gaze—“that I must be starving. Because when pork-’n’beans starts smelling like ambrosia, something ain’t right.”

  She dipped her spoon into the beans for a taste—not so much from hunger, but to have something to do with her hands. But the moment the food touched her tongue, her hunger returned. “They are ambrosia.” A little sauce dripped onto her chin and she wiped it away with her finger.

  “Really?”

  He caught her hand and brought it to his mouth. His lips closed around her finger, and a warm wetness surrounded the digit. She felt his tongue slide against the underside of her knuckle. Then, slowly, he pulled her moist finger free.

  God help her, if she didn’t think about sticking her finger straight back into the pot and offering for him to lick some more. Of all the food and sex talks at the Divorced, Desperate and Delicious club, pork-’n’-beans had never been considered. Wait until she told Lacy and Sue!

  His soft gaze locked on her eyes again, but this time she didn’t think he was too close. To the contrary, she wanted him closer.

  “Yup, ambrosia.” He leaned in, so close his breath brushed her cheek. So close that the pork-’n’-beans lost all appeal, despite her hunger. All she wanted, all she could smell, was him. Fresh grass and mint.

  “You know,” he said, “I could probably stand here all day and just stare at you.”

  Her heart hiccupped. “You could?”

  “I could if my stomach wasn’t chewing on my backbone.”

  She looked down to get away from his smiling eyes, needing a second to sort through the feelings that were chasing logic right out of her. Feelings that said she wanted him to kiss her. That said, the hell with being logical about getting involved with him. Feelings that said: For God’s sake you almost died today, shouldn’t you learn to enjoy the moment? Go for it, take the most of right now. Use that pot of beans to the fullest.

  Ah, but before she surrendered to those feelings, she needed to think. And to think hard.

  She dropped her gaze and saw Goodwill. Then she smiled and let out a deep breath. “There might be another reason, too.”

  “A reason for what?” He ran a hand up her arm, goose bumps chasing after it.

  She looked up. “For you not to stand here.”

  His mouth drew nearer. “Why’s that?”

  “Because Goodwill is about pee on your shoe again.”

  “Damn!” He jumped back right in time. “What is it with this dog and my shoes?”

  “Maybe your feet stink,” Kathy said, and laughed so hard she bumped into the counter.

  “My feet don’t stink! Well, they didn’t before he pissed on them.” He looked down at the dog, then at her. “You’d better make sure he doesn’t go on the carpet. Claire will have a fit.”

  Kathy glanced around. “That carpet looks like it’s thirty years old.”

  “Yeah, but she’s at least seventy, so to her it’s practically brand-new.”

  Luke grabbed some paper towels and cleaned up Good-will’s oops, then washed his hands.

  Kathy didn’t stop smiling as she found two plates and set them on the table. Then she emptied the rest of the deviled ham into a bowl, added some mayonnaise and gave it a good stir. “For our crackers,” she told him. “We can pretend it’s caviar.”

  “Yum,” he replied.

  “Yum?” She looked up, still stirring. “You like caviar?”

  His gaze was on her chest again. “Do I like what?” He looked up.

  If it was any other man, she would have called him on it. She didn’t, though. Vaguely, she remembered not calling him on it when she’d first arrived at his house. Of course, at the time she’d been planning on sleeping with him. She’d dressed to impress, to elicit exactly this reaction.

  It had seemed like such a good plan, then. Exactly what were her plans now?

  Chapter Eighteen

  Joey used the small flashlight on his keychain to see in the dark. He covered his nose and eyed the corpse still positioned on the throne just like it had been left, Donald still completely engrossed in the birding magazine. “Told you I’d come back. Bet you didn’t believe me, did you?”

  Even with his hand over his nose, the smell crawled up Joey’s sinuses. “Is that you or…?” He looked around the porta-potty. “It’s the crapper, right? Yeah, I’d say so.” He grabbed the magazine from Donald’s lap and slipped it inside the waistband of his pants. “Get any good birding tips?”

  Pocketing his flashlight, he reached down and used everything he had to lift Donald and yank up the guy’s pants. The man’s legs remained bent
, which made getting him out of the enclosed plastic shithouse a little like getting a square peg out of a round hole. Finally, after several bangs and clatters, nearly knocking over the entire construction and hitting his toe at least twice, he managed to get Donald out.

  If that wasn’t hard enough, fitting a stiff, bent-legged man in the car proved even more trying. “Damn, you’re just dead weight,” Joey muttered. Then he laughed at his unintentional pun.

  Thankfully, the potty position was almost the same as the backseat position, and once he had Donald in the car, getting him set up was a piece of cake. Nevertheless, Donald’s hands were still open as if he waiting for someone to pass him a plate of food.

  Joey picked up the man’s hat, which had fallen to the ground, and set it on Donald’s head. Then, just to make a point, he reached around the dead man and buckled him in again.

  Job done, he leaned against the car to catch his breath. “I found you a final resting place. It’s just a few miles up the road. It’s got some nice trees, and there’s a little creek close by. It’s probably better than you deserve. Better than Freddy got. I picked up a shovel at Wal-Mart, and we should have you a few feet under in a couple of hours.” Joey wiped some sweat from his brow and looked at Donald’s hands, which were still outstretched. “You can keep all your fingers, too. Lorenzo can just go to hell as far as I’m concerned.”

  Looking up at the dark sky, he took his weight off his bad toe. Then, wanting to tell someone but having limited options, he said conversationally, “Oh, you’ll never guess what happened. The redhead walked into the café where I met that Foster idiot. I don’t like him any more than I liked you. Maybe even less.” He smiled. “I actually managed to get her out of there before he saw her. I did a good thing, Donald! Damn, if that doesn’t feel good.”

  Joey felt the smile slip away. “Of course, Foster swears we’ll have their location sometime tonight. And if that’s the case, she’s not out of the woods yet.” He pulled the birding magazine from the waistband of his pants and tossed it onto the backseat. “But you know, my mama used to say it wasn’t over until you quit fighting. Not that she was amazingly wise, but she had her moments.” In the distance, Joey heard an owl. “Point is, I’m not through fighting. And yeah, I know you’d say I won’t win. I’ll admit there’s a good chance I’ll end up like you—dead and waiting for someone to bury my ass.”