Dakota Blues Box Set

by Lynne M Spreen

  She would try again, after they endured the horrible present. Bruised and damaged, they would persevere. They would find peace with each other, eventually. It might be an imperfect peace, but they could grow from the experience. Wasn’t that how long-term marriages worked?

  She grimaced at the thought of the girl he’d run off with. Karen had seen her once, a gliding image of tawny mane, small waist, and flaring hips. Young enough to be his daughter.

  Logic threatened to re-emerge as Karen wondered why he was here. He could simply have called to express his condolences. Had they broken up? Was he ready to come home? Should she let him, after all the pain he’d inflicted?

  I don’t care, she thought. For whatever reason, he chose to be here.

  He was home. He always came home, regardless of the allure of the women with whom he’d flirted over the years. They came and went, whereas their marriage had endured, through childlessness and her father’s death and that breast cancer scare a few years ago.

  So their marriage had problems. Whose didn’t? They might have married too early, before they knew who they were or what they wanted. Young and excited, they decided not to wait. They had decent jobs—her, an entry-level management position at Global. Him, at a firm where he could learn the ways of Wall Street. They bought a townhouse in Dana Point. Made money, saved money.

  Life was good. Then things went bad.

  She remembered him crying after the first miscarriage. He was so good to her then, bringing a washcloth for her forehead and reading to her as she lay in bed, stunned with grief.

  When they lost the second, he read to himself and she stared at the ceiling.

  By the fourth miscarriage, they agonized in solitude.

  They drifted apart, but when life reared its head and threatened to crush one of them, they battled together until things settled down. Still, they continued to drift.

  She pressed her nose against his skin, inhaling a warm musk that recalled love and security. They had talked about growing old together, here in this house. And then one night around Christmas, he hadn’t come home. The next morning, he texted her. He would be back to get his things.

  They fought. After the smoke cleared, he was gone.

  Her anger propelled her for a while. She changed the locks and distracted herself with home improvement, reorganizing closets, moving furniture, cleaning out the garage. She updated lighting and replaced flooring, told herself she could handle this. She would manage.

  But when time passed and she began to imagine him happy with his new life, something broke inside. She drank barrels of wine, missing work for the first time in years. Peggy covered for her, directing staff and making excuses.

  Eventually, Karen learned to compartmentalize her grief. She coped. She kept moving. Just barely.

  Now she lifted Steve’s arm and snuggled against his chest. He mumbled, still asleep, and pulled her closer.

  Despite her pitiful attempts to move on, the truth was she would rather have him home. They could make it work. She would try harder.

  She thought of the funeral. What a relief it would be to have him with her in North Dakota. There would be a Mass, and then the burial. A simple plot in the church cemetery next to her dad on the edge of the prairie.

  Listening to his heartbeat, she cried herself to sleep.

  WHEN SHE AWOKE, STEVE was already up and dressed. He brought her a cup of coffee, then sat on the edge of the bed while she shrugged into her robe. The morning sun was muted, dimmed by the fog that rolled in overnight.

  She inhaled the dark aroma of the brew, its steaming richness bracing her for the day ahead. His presence comforted, but the fact of her mother’s death clung to her like the corrosive remnants of a nightmare. First Dad, now Mom. And Karen had no siblings. She was the only one left who remembered growing up in the white clapboard house in Dickinson, getting her book bag ready for school, or having breakfast at the gray laminate kitchen table.

  She rested her forehead in the heel of her palm.

  “I’m sorry, babe.”

  She nodded, trying to breathe, trying to get back on track. “From what Aunt Marie said, it’s all organized. Mom made the arrangements a year ago. Remember when she had pneumonia?” Karen hadn’t gone to see her then, either.

  “What about your work?” he asked.

  “It’s a bad time to leave. Lou and the guys from corporate are on me to cut payroll. I’m trying to hold them off.” She looked up, searching his eyes for comfort. For so many years, they’d shared work problems, hashing things out together, coming up with solutions neither one could have invented solo.

  He looked away.

  So much for that avenue. “I’ll go in this morning, make some calls, and delay any action until we get back.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” he mumbled.

  Karen set her empty mug on the nightstand. “I need to pack. Not just clothes. My files, my electronics. I’ll work while I’m away.” She reached into the closet and tried to pull a suitcase from a high shelf. Steve reached above her head and set it on the floor.

  Impulsively, she threw her arms around him. “It would have been so much harder without you.” She pressed her face to the soft cotton of his shirt.

  His arms hung limply at his sides.

  She let go, stepped back, and studied his face. How well she knew his expressions. “What’s wrong?”

  He drew in a deep breath. Stuck his hands in his pockets.

  “You’re not coming, are you?”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why not? You’re here now.” She touched his cheek, turned his face so he was looking at her. “I know it’ll be hard, but we can get through it if we’re together.”

  He glanced away. Toward the window.

  Toward the driveway.

  Karen’s knees wobbled. She sat down hard on the bed.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “Last night, when we made love, I thought you had changed your mind, but you didn’t, did you?”

  He sat down next to her. “I got the call from Aunt Marie, and my first impulse was to check on you. To help you. And then on the porch, you looked so sad, I lost it.” He reached over and tried to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear.

  She batted his hand away.

  “I was planning to come by anyway,” he said. “I needed to get a few things, and—”

  “What, did you forget your golf shoes?”

  He sighed. “And I wanted to tell you so you wouldn’t hear it from anyone else. My girlfriend is pregnant.”

  She clutched the bedding, her eyes squeezed shut. After all their losses and all their grief, Steve still got to have a child. This miracle she wasn’t granted in her young and fertile years, he’d received in his fifties. It went beyond unfairness, beyond cruelty to something malicious, cosmic, intentional.

  “Get out.” Her voice sounded raspy. Feral.

  “Okay, but I still need—”

  “Get out! Get out! Get out!” She jumped up, pushing and shoving him toward the front door.

  He grabbed her wrists. “Karen, stop. Please. I’m going.”

  And so he did. Walked out the door and down their driveway for the last time.

  She slammed the door so hard, something crashed and shattered. She slid down the wall until she reached the cold tile floor of the entryway.

  The news obliterated her. It was like that film of the nuclear blast, where the two-story house bends sideways and then vanishes.

  She had been ready to take him back. Even the thought of him in bed naked with Miss Tawny Hair hadn’t stopped her.

  When Karen had first found out about the two of them, months ago, she had comforted herself with fantasies of mayhem—of him losing his job and living in poverty, of public humiliation, of murder. At times, she thought of new and devious ways to hurt him, but then her emotions would turn over and she would simply miss him, as badly as she missed her unborn children. As badly as that. Her ribs had ached from all the crying.
r />   She was an anxious person, whether by birth or training. Growing up with a hot-tempered father and a mother who couldn’t protect her—these things had shaped her. But with Steve, she felt safe. Relatively. As much as one could in real life.

  And even if love changed over time, and if their marriage wasn’t all fireworks and romance, so what? What did they expect? Relationships changed. You stuck together. That’s how she was raised.

  She leaned her head back against the wall, eyes closed, mouth clamped shut in a rictus of pain. Her mother. Now Steve. It was too much. Life was too damn much.

  She had been pretending he would come back, thinking he’d dump the girl like he always did.

  But the girl he had dumped was Karen.

  She hauled herself up, bracing her trembling body with one arm against the wall, waiting for the lightheadedness to pass. Then, she staggered down the hallway, swept the alarm clock off the nightstand, and collapsed into bed.

  Chapter 8

  Hours later, Karen’s phone rang. She opened one eye, winced at the brightness of the room, and pulled the pillow over her head.

  It rang again. She let it go to voicemail.

  On the third attempt, she groaned, thinking it might be important, although who remained in her world to be concerned about?

  She fumbled for the device and clicked the answer button.

  It was Barbara, her assistant at Global. “You have a one o’clock with Ms. Castillo. I planned to tell you when you came in, but it’s getting later and—is everything okay?”

  “Reyna’s at the office?” Karen rubbed her face. “I thought she was going back up north with the other guys.”

  “She decided to stay, and she wants to meet with you about staffing.”

  “Wonderful.” Karen would have to go in. Castillo had something up her sleeve. Hiding under the covers was not an option.

  “Karen? Still there?”

  “I’m here.”

  “Reyna’s been parading around like she owns the place. You’ll want to keep up. If it were me, I’d wear my best outfit. Maybe have a little extra coffee, too.” Barbara sounded calm, but Karen sensed fear.

  “I’ll be there in a while.” Stifling a groan, Karen sat up. Her shoulders ached, and her stomach rolled. She felt like she had the flu, but it was just the wreckage of her life. She swallowed around a hard knot in her throat, but no tears came. Probably they would, probably at her one o’clock with Reyna, the way things were going.

  It felt unnatural, to get dressed and go to war with someone at your office, acting like that was important, when inside you didn’t really care, because real life—the one with your loved ones—had just been vaporized.

  Karen sat at the edge of her bed, staring vacantly at the hardwood floor. Her limbs numb, she considered pulling the covers back over her head and letting the world spin where it may. If an earthquake hit right then, she wouldn’t have moved, though chunks of ceiling might fall on her head. She lacked the energy. And she didn’t care.

  She could stop fighting, and let Reyna have her way with Newport. Karen would board the jet to North Dakota, see her mother’s casket lowered into the ground, and afterwards drag herself back here to deal with what was left.

  Maybe.

  But there might not be anything to return to. The employees might all be gone, fired in her absence. There might be a termination notice in her own mailbox, and a ‘For Rent’ sign on Global’s door.

  Across the bedroom, on top of her dresser, stood a mantel-style antique clock. It never ran right. The tarnished hands stood frozen at twelve-thirty. For years, she had meant to get the thing fixed, but she hadn’t done that either. Too busy working.

  The clock had been her father’s, a retirement gift from Dakota Gas.

  He had been a hardass, but he’d suffered, barely making it out of childhood alive. Maybe he’d been the best father he was capable of. And her mother, trying to protect Karen from his temper. Trying, but failing. Even in spite of that, she had done her best, too.

  Hadn’t they all?

  Karen lay back on the bed and curled up in a fetal position. For a while she stared at the wall, but then the tears came. She wept for her family, her marriage, and the whole cold arrangement of being human, until the pillow was soaked and her eyes were swollen.

  And now, she needed to get up and face Reyna.

  She took a slow, deep breath and straightened her spine. Turned on the shower and stepped under the cold spray, gasping when the icy needles stung her skin.

  The water warmed, became hot, and slowly, slowly, her head cleared. Her thinking clarified as she felt herself coming back to life. Her blood stirred with the heat, and with the beginnings of anger, which found a convenient target in her soon-to-be-ex-husband. And at herself.

  For all the pain of her marriage ending, she had known it was coming. Anybody with eyes could see Steve was a philanderer. He had been for years, ever since her final miscarriage. To overcome grief, she’d thrown herself into her work. Steve found comfort in other women.

  And she was furious with Global. If they weren’t greedy assholes, assessing the value of their employees by the number of hours burned for the job, Karen might have taken the time to see her mother. To tend to her marriage. To have a life.

  She stepped out of the shower, vigorously toweling off as if to jumpstart her circulation. She strode down the hall, into her closet, and back out again with a dark blue ensemble. Her movements cold and precise, she pulled on a blouse and slacks, stepped into a fierce pair of heels, and stuck diamond studs in the lobes of her ears.

  Reyna Castillo chose to stay an extra day? There could only be one reason. She wanted to take a machete to the office.

  Karen wouldn’t allow it.

  REYNA CASTILLO PACED back and forth in front of Wes’ desk. He was hunched over a pile of spreadsheets, his balding pate shining in the bright morning sun, his lips moving as he studied the unfamiliar numbers. She scowled at the fact that this man, this dilettante, held such a position of authority. When she directed him to get busy, he’d ducked his head and rolled up his sleeves, fearful of her power.

  What Wes didn’t know was that if she didn’t deliver, by this time next week she’d be answering phones in customer service.

  Reyna stopped in front of the windows, gazing out at the coastline. Far below, palm trees bent in the midday breeze, an early Santa Ana cranking up. Whitecaps frothed at the mouth of the harbor, and fishing boats tossed in the waves. “What is Karen Grace afraid of?”

  Wes looked up from the paperwork spread across the desk. “Huh?”

  Reyna fixed her dark gaze on him. “You’ve worked with Karen a long time. What’s her greatest fear?”

  He cocked his head, his eyes disappearing behind the reflection of light on his glasses. “She’s not afraid of being fired, if that’s where you’re going.”

  “Okay, then.” Reyna sat across from him. “So, what’s the worst thing that could happen to her?”

  “Hurt her people,” he said. “She’ll do anything to protect them.”

  BARBARA BROUGHT TWO steaming cups of coffee into Karen’s office. “You look good.”

  “Thanks. Somebody told me to dress up.”

  “You’re welcome. How are you doing?”

  Karen stuck her nose in the mug, closed her eyes, and breathed deeply. “Fine.”

  “Liar.”

  “I’ll manage. People get through this. I’m not the only one.”

  “That’s very true.”

  Karen set her cup down with a clunk. Barb’s husband had died the year before. “I’m sorry. I sometimes forget.”

  “Don’t worry about it. Believe it or not, life goes on. But you know that.”

  The two of them sat quietly for a few minutes, comfortable with each other, thinking their own thoughts until Karen broke the silence. “So. Tomorrow.” She described her travel plans, when she’d be back and what Barbara might do to keep the place together in the meantime. “But you know al
l that. Everything will be fine. I’m lucky to have you.”

  “Well, you were,” Barbara said.

  Karen looked up. “Are you kidding me?”

  “Nope. I’m getting out of this place. This is my two-week notice.”

  “I had a feeling,” Karen said. “You were just too cool about everything.”

  “That’s me. I’m cool.”

  “I sure am sorry you’re leaving. Greener pastures, I hope?”

  “You bet. Gail hired me to work with her at the career closet in Laguna.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Doing good. Helping poor women get jobs. Classes, mentoring, running the cash register, hanging up clothes. Whatever Gail needs.”

  Karen didn’t know what to say. It was a step down for Barbara, a big step, but the woman was grinning like a fool.

  “I need a change,” said Barbara. “This place is getting too serious. Life’s too short to work so hard. You should come with me. Gail’d hire you in a hot second. Wouldn’t we have fun?”

  Surprised by a sense of longing, Karen shook her head. “I can’t. I need the money.”

  “Yeah, that’s a bummer for you younger people. I’ve got my pension.” Barbara handed Karen her letter. “But I will miss you, and believe it or not, I’ll miss this place.”

  The two women hugged, Barbara went back to her office, and Karen returned to her work. As much as the loss of Barbara slayed her, she had no time to grieve. Her meeting with Reyna would take place in less than an hour.

  Just then, Emily, the accounting supervisor, tapped on the door jamb. “Do you have a minute?”

  Karen forced a smile. “Sure.”

  Emily pushed the door closed behind her, bracelets jingling as she propelled her wheelchair across the office. “What did the auditors say?”

  “We can all relax. They gave us an A plus.”

  “Good to hear, but that’s no guarantee,” said Emily. “Did you get any sense of how it looks for my department?”