Who's Taming Who?

by Susan Kohler

  You are now the proud owner of one brand new secret admirer, fully equipped and totally devoted; he comes with a lifetime guarantee for love.

  Lanie smiled knowing it was from Frank, and knowing that she was still planning on making him pay for betting on her like, in Tina’s not very flattering phrase, a prize racehorse. Secretariat indeed! He would pay and pay dearly! If Frank thought winning her was going to be that easy, boy, was he wrong!

  The next day she found a second note. This time on her doorstep. This one was different, for one thing it was typed, it read:

  Everyone bets once in a while but not everyone wins. Take a chance on your secret admirer and lay down a bet on love, to win.

  There was an envelope with a ticket to Santa Anita Racetrack, a tout sheet and five $2.00 bills in it. The next day she found another note. This time it was just a note, handwritten, no gifts.

  The fourth note, a day later, included flowers, red roses:

  I know you work with plants all day, but sometimes flowers are just for play, and sometimes they mean something special. These mean love. Your secret admirer

  Soon, it seemed like Lanie was getting notes and small gifts almost every time she turned around. One day, she found an unmarked cassette in the tape deck of her car. When she turned it on she heard Doris Day singing, Once I Had A Secret Love. Some of the notes were written by hand and some were typed.

  She noticed that not all of the handwritten notes had the same handwriting. A couple of them were in the form of limericks.

  One of them read:

  There once was a secret admirer

  Whose passion grew ever higher

  But the one that he loved

  Pushed, shouted and shoved

  Him away, ‘stead of drawing him nigher.

  She never saw any of the notes or gifts as they were being delivered, but she thought they were all from Frank. At least, that’s what she thought before she noticed the discrepancy in the handwriting.

  Her favorite notes came with a small pearl in each envelope. The first one also included a length of sturdy string and a needle. It read:

  String these up as soon as each one comes with a strong double knot in between and when we’re more than secret chums, you’ll have something to make others green.

  A few days later it was followed by a note that came with a bottle of expensive cologne:

  There’s a scent of romance in the air, can you smell it? Your secret admirer.

  When she went to take out her garbage, she found a note on the trash can:

  A secret admirer is a terrible thing to waste.

  In her rose bushes she found:

  Let my secret admiration for you blossom into full bloom.

  On her front door she found a cartoon of a sad-faced clown that simply read:

  A secret admirer needs love, too.

  But the gifts continued. A box filled with lacy underwear came with a note that read:

  I’m panting for your love. Your secret admirer.

  With a scratcher lottery ticket:

  I’ve got an itch to scratch. Your secret admirer.

  Another limerick turned up:

  There once was a secret admirer

  Who loved one with fire and with ire

  She was a real redhead

  Who he should have bedded

  But her temper was really most dire

  Another note that came with a decorated gift box read:

  I’d love to put rings on your fingers and bells on your toes, but will you settle for bracelets and earrings instead? Your secret admirer.

  Soon, she had four brand new bracelets, three sets of earrings, a stuffed Teddy bear, six brands of cologne, and even a dozen pairs of lacy underwear in various pastel shades, plus ruby red, emerald green and royal blue, not to mention basic black.

  The weird thing was, Frank never called her and he never came over. She sat by her phone night after night but never admitted, even to herself, that she was waiting for him to call. Finally, she decided to call him. When she did, the infuriating rat wasn’t home or he wasn’t answering. She left a message on his machine. He never called back. The next day she called his office and asked for Laura.

  “Frank’s been on a business trip, Lanie. He’s in Texas,” Laura told her. “He’s been gone for almost two weeks now.”

  “Then who’s been sending me all those corny secret admirer notes and gifts?” Lanie asked. “Did Frank ask you or Kate to send them while he was gone just to keep me off balance?”

  “No, of course not,” Laura told her, “and I can answer for Kate, too. Heck, she’s so busy on her honeymoon I don’t think she’d have time to write a secret admirer note, let alone send it.”

  “Well, it’s funny and sweet, and corny, and silly and it’s driving me nuts--but if it’s not Frank behind these notes, then who is it?” Lanie said, “That’s kind of spooky.”

  After she hung up, Laura dialed Kate. “We have her intrigued and a little spooked, Kate. She knows Frank didn’t send the notes, at least not all of them. I don’t think she has a clue.”

  “Doesn’t she suspect us?” Kate’s voice sounded strange, breathless. “I would if I were her.”

  “Well, she did. She asked me straight out if Frank had asked us to deliver the notes for him while he was gone. I said no, but I didn’t volunteer anything else,” Laura replied. “And what’s wrong with your voice?”

  “Well, he didn’t ask us to send the notes,” Kate said smugly. “He doesn’t even know about it. And nothing’s wrong with my voice, it’s just that Bob’s here with me.”

  “Oh, I see. Honeymooners. Well, the gifts you added to go with the notes were a nice touch,” Laura complimented Kate.

  “What gifts?” Kate was puzzled. “I didn’t send any gifts.”

  There was an ominous silence before Laura asked, “You haven’t included any gifts? No lottery tickets, bracelets, lingerie?”

  “No, not a thing, and you?” Kate asked.

  “No, nothing.” Laura paused. “And she’s had a lot of gifts including items of jewelry, cologne, lacy lingerie, lottery tickets, roses, even loose pearls complete with needle and thread,” Laura itemized. “It’s got her almost scared, except that deep down she really thinks it’s all from Frank.”

  “Oh, oh.” Kate summed it up. “If it’s not Frank, then who is it? Who’s her secret admirer?”

  That night Bob listened as Kate told him all about the secret admirer, admitting that she and Laura had sent some of the notes, the limericks, but not any of the gifts.

  “Do you think Frank’s sending them somehow?” Kate asked. “Even from corporate headquarters?”

  “Kate, he’s out of state, and these things are being hand delivered all hours of the day and night. How could he be doing it?” Bob questioned reasonably. “The only ones he would trust to deliver gifts and notes are you and Laura, so it’s not him.”

  “Are you and Jack up to something?” she asked him suspiciously. “I don’t trust either one of you.”

  “I’m ‘up to’ continuing my honeymoon.” He kissed her without really answering her question.

  “Yes sir, O mighty husband and boss. Good idea.” She pulled him to her and ended all conversation for the night, except for a few moans.

  Jack and Bob conferred by phone the next day. Neither one knew just who was sending the gifts, although they had each sent some of the notes.

  “Kate and Laura are freaking, trying to figure out if Frank’s doing this or if someone else is after Lanie,” Jack said.

  “Both of them have sent some notes, too,” Bob said. “Laura told me that some days Lanie gets two or three separate deliveries. She and Kate are aiming at every other day.”

  “And you and I are filling the days in between, and driving our wives crazy.” Jack laughed.

  “Yeah. Isn’t it fun?” Bob sounded smug. “It’s hard to get either one of them thrown off balance, and right now we’ve got them both reeling. Even Kate’s worried that
someone may really be stalking Lanie.”

  “But I wonder who’s giving Lanie the gifts. I really hope it’s not a creep. There’s all kinds of weirdoes running around out there these days,” Jack said before he went back to work.

  Laura called Tina. “What do you know about the secret admirer’s letters and gifts that Lanie’s been getting lately?”

  “When Frank first told me he was going to do it, I thought it was a great idea. While he was out of town I even sent a few notes every two or three days, but no gifts,” Tina told her, not noticing that Cassie, sitting beside her, was grinning from ear to ear.

  “Grandma,” Cassie said excitedly into the phone later that night, “it’s working. It’s really working. They don’t have a clue.”

  “Okay, Honey,” her grandma told her, “here’s what you do next”

  Meanwhile, Lanie sorted out the notes by the handwriting and different type styles, along with the differing content of the messages. She figured out that there had to be at least seven different secret admirers. As near as she could guess they were:

  Kate and Laura, Bob and Jack, Tina, Frank. She bet that one of them sent the pearls, and someone else, the one who sent all the small gifts.

  She believed that Kate and Laura sent the Limericks. Bob and Jack had sent the notes on her trash can and in her rose bush, among others. Tina was behind the clown drawing on her front door. Frank was responsible for the first note and all of the notes that came with the pearls.

  The only one she couldn’t guess the identity of was the person behind the other gifts. That was mystifying and almost spooky.

  That last one had her perplexed. Who was it? The whole thing was like a soap opera and Lanie decided she could hardly wait for the next exciting installment.

  The pearls had been turned into a beautiful necklace. There was a small diamond band about a quarter of the way around the necklace, followed by an emerald that hung down from the middle of the necklace and another diamond band about a quarter of the way back to the clasp at the back of her neck. It really was an exquisite piece of jewelry.

  If Frank had handed her an expensive piece of jewelry like that, she would have felt obligated to refuse to accept it. She wasn’t sure what to do about it however since he had given it to her pearl by pearl. Was each pearl a separate gift? She sighed realizing that she was fooling herself, she couldn’t accept the necklace even if he did send it one piece at a time.

  She reached out to pick up the phone and realized that she had trapped herself. She couldn’t give the necklace back without calling him. She groaned remembering the look on his face when he had said that she would be the one to call him first. Oh hell, she thought, I can’t call him without making him think he’s right. She decided to wait a few days to think it over.

  The very next morning a solution presented itself. The latest gift from her secret admirer included a brochure and a ticket to a weekend trip on a mystery train for the coming weekend, along with a note that simply read:

  It’s no mystery why I care so much. Please? Your secret admirer.

  Intrigued and infuriated she decided to go, if for no other reason than to tell the big jerk off. At least that’s what she told herself.

  Frank didn’t know when he decided to follow Laura’s advice to become Lanie’s secret admirer that he wouldn’t be the only one. He only knew that he had to do something original. He found an absolutely stunning pearl necklace and then cut it up, sending the pearls out one by one. Small gifts that would add up to something special.

  Like Lanie, he realized that there were other secret admirers and he figured out who most of the others were. All except one. All except the one who sent small gifts, and that made him mad as hell. Sending Lanie gifts, especially jewelry and lingerie, was his territory, his exclusive territory. The word jealous never entered his mind.

  He was going crazy waiting for Lanie to call him and say she couldn’t accept the necklace like good, decent women always do, so that he could then fight it out with her. What gave her the nerve to accept intimate gifts from strangers anyway?

  Then came the day when he found a note on the front seat of his car. It read:

  It’s my turn. Please? Your secret admirer.

  Attached was a ticket to a mystery train.

  Chapter Six

  Lanie was both excited and apprehensive about the upcoming weekend aboard the mystery train. She wasn’t really sure if she wanted to go but she couldn’t bring herself to stay home. She wasn’t even sure which clothes she wanted to take. Should she take plain, comfortable clothes or something fancier?

  There was only one thing she was sure of, she didn’t want to be teased or to face any speculation from either of her partners, especially Jack, about exactly why she was leaving early on a Friday night. She avoided that by working right up until five o’clock. That’s why she only had about an hour after leaving work to shower, change, and get to the train station. Tina was already at her house, waiting to take her to the station. Tina would stay in the house with Cassie for the weekend.

  Lanie was extremely nervous about the weekend. There were so many questions whirling around inside her head, she was glad no one could see into her brain. She kept thinking of questions like: Was Frank the secret admirer behind this trip? If not, who was? What would she do if it were Frank? What would she do if it weren’t Frank? No stupid, she told herself, it’s Frank. It has to be Frank. Could Kate and Laura have set this up?

  Then there were the other questions, things like: Wasn’t she mad at Frank about something? If so, what was it? She seemed to have forgotten, exactly. Something about a bet. But then, like he had pointed out, what kind of man would bet his whole future just to win lunch every week for a year? Did she have to give him back all the gifts? Or just the necklace? What about the lingerie? She really should return the lingerie. Damn!

  And why was she such a klutz every time she saw the man? She never had accidents; she was usually as agile as a cat. Did Frank make her nervous? Why? And why was he such a klutz every time he saw her? Lanie would bet her last nickel that Frank didn’t have a clumsy bone in his body.

  There’s probably a million reasons why she should skip the trip and avoid Frank, she told herself, but on the other hand, she couldn’t really think of even one really good reason, and this trip sounded like it would be a lot of fun. It had been a long time since she had a fun weekend just for herself.

  There was a brochure along with the ticket that specified casual clothes except for the formal Saturday night dinner, which was to be held at an old country inn in Monterey Bay. The brochure also gave hints and rules for solving the mysteries. Finally it explained that all meals were prepaid, but bar drinks were not.

  Lanie already had everything all packed and waiting in her car, ready to go. She had picked out all her best shorts and slacks, including soft sweaters and several T-shirts. Her casual clothes were attractive, comfortable and practical but also nothing special. She wanted Frank to realize that she was there to relax and have some fun, not because she was interested in him. As far as she was concerned, she told herself, she could have as much fun if Frank weren’t even there. Sure she could, she admitted ruefully, facing some of her feelings. Not!

  Since she was running late for the train, she let Tina drive to the station. Tina had the spirit of a race car driver, fast, but always completely safe. Cassie rode in the backseat. They got to the station just in the nick of time.

  Tina helped her unload the luggage which they then gave to a very young porter. She barely had time to give Tina and Cassie a hug before she had to board the train. Lanie was nervous and excited as she kissed and hugged them both.

  “Have fun, Mommy,” Cassie told her. “I hope you and Frank solve the mystery and win the prize.”

  “I will sweetie. Be good for Aunt Tina, and make sure she behaves herself.”

  Cassie giggled, “Aw Mommy.”

  “Just solve the mystery of your love life,” Tina quipped, hugging her
, “and leave the murder mysteries alone.”

  “If I even have a love life, it’s a mystery to me,” Lanie told Tina. “Take care of Cassie for me.”

  She started to get on the train but stopped herself as a thought came to her. “Hey!” she asked Cassie. “How do you know Frank will be on the train?”

  “I must have heard someone mention it,” Cassie said evasively, looking sideways at Tina.

  “It wasn’t me!” Tina protested.

  Lanie decided to let the matter drop and got on the train.

  Frank was also running late for the train. He was just as puzzled about who had sent a ticket to him as Lanie was about her own ticket. The difference was, he didn’t care! This realization was something of a shock to him. Bet or no bet he really wanted to see Lanie, but he seriously doubted that she wanted to see him. Oh no! He thought with a touch of panic, could he be falling in love? Part of him wanted to run, and part of him wanted to send Kate and Laura a thank-you note. No, he thought, that’s premature. He decided to wait a while before he did either one.

  Once inside, the train looked almost like a movie set, like the train in Murder On The Orient Express. Lanie found her compartment on the train and listened as the porter showed her the tiny washroom and bed, and the connecting door to the room next to hers. The compartment looked old-fashioned, it had panels on the walls that looked like wood, and a small fold-down bed. It reminded her of an old James Bond movie; she wasn’t sure which one but it had Sean Connery as Bond.

  When the bed wasn’t down, there was a sofa and a small table. On the back of the compartment door there were hooks for her to hang some clothes. There was a luggage stand in one corner for her suitcase. There was also a small sink and counter for her cosmetics, with a tiny mirror.

  The smiling porter accepted his tip and walked away, tipping his hat he said, “Dinner will be served in the dining car at eight. We start serving cocktails as soon as we leave the station. We’re on time today so that should be within the next five minutes.”