by June Whyte
“And I’m not, you know. A floozy, that is. It’s not my fault if men fall in love with me.”
“You’re definitely not a floozy Mum, and Penny shouldn’t say things like that to you. But—”
“So…Henry and I are getting married at five-thirty today.”
“M-m-ma—”
“Only at the registry office,” my mother broke in. “And we have all the paperwork with us.” She gave me one of her full-on, mother-daughter, I-love-you smiles. And I knew right then, the next thing she’d say would be to ask me to leave the safety of my house and put my head in a killer’s noose. “Henry and I would really love you to come with us and be our witness, Dani. In fact, we’d be proud of your support.”
“Oooh, God.”
Mum’s smile faltered. “What is it, dear? You don’t mind having Henry for a father do you?”
“It’s not that, Mum. It’s just that—”
“You don’t think we’re too old, do you?”
“Ooh, Mum, of course not. If you and Henry love each other you should get married. It’s just that—”
“Oh, thank you darling. I knew you’d understand,” she said and wrapped her arms around me so tightly I could feel her heart beating under the mauve lace. “Come here, Henry,” she called out. “Give your soon-to-be new daughter a kiss. And don’t go rubbing your prickly five o’clock shadow over her face. Dani’s always had very sensitive skin.”
Henry—a goofy smile lighting up his wrinkled face—came shuffling over, his walker silent as he ploughed through the pile of the carpet. “Hello, my dear,” he said, planting a dry kiss on my cheek. “Did your mother tell you our grand news?”
“She certainly did. Congratulations, Henry.” I returned his kiss, breathing in the old-fashioned smell of peppermint, cough drops and velvet soap.
Over Henry’s shoulder I could see my mother smiling at the image of two of her favorite people cuddling each other. “Shall we go in the kitchen and have a cup of tea?” she suggested.
“First,” I said thinking of what a cup of tea would do to my already bursting bladder. “I have to use the—”
Was that the sound of stealthy movement on the other side of the back door?
I froze.
Next thing there was a splintering crash and the back door blew open and three grim-reaper-type men stormed into the passageway, guns at the ready.
“Hands up!”
“Don’t move!”
“Everyone on the floor!”
Mum screamed. Henry farted. And not knowing which order to obey first, I dropped to my knees then snapped my hands into the air.
“Don’t shoot….” I croaked and promptly had a hot flush. Red face—sweaty armpits—the whole shebang.
Mum, recovering first, flapped her hands at the gunmen. “Go away!” she told them and her voice had that bossy, don’t-mess-with-me edge that meant she was really pissed off. “You boys must be in the wrong house. No one here has any money or jewels, so march right back out of here. Can’t you see you’re upsetting my daughter and my fiancé?”
And then, just when I thought I’d have to throw myself in front of my mother to save her from a bullet, Simon burst through the door.
“Simon?”
“Dani, are you okay? Is the killer still in the house?”
I shook my head. Not sure what was going on. “It was only Mum and Henry,” I told him and blinked as he pulled me to my feet and wrapped his arms around me.
“I knew you wouldn’t stay put,” he growled, one arm still hugging me to him while he brushed a stray tendril of hair from my eyes. “God, Dani, I was so worried.”
And then he kissed me. And everyone and everything ceased to exist.
“Hey, Templar,” said one of the gunmen finally breaking up the kiss. “Do you want us to arrest any of these people? If not, you might need to ring the ambulance for the old guy with the walker. His color doesn’t look too good.”
“Don’t worry, Henry will be fine. Just give him a minute,” said Mum, taking her fiancé by the arm and helping him through the door into the lounge room. “He just needs a bit of a sit-down and a nice cup of tea. Don’t you Henry?”
Henry, his face a funny purple color, nodded several times, attempted a weak grimacing smile of confidence and then flopped back into the lounge chair, definitely ready for his “bit of a sit-down”. He’d be lucky to recover in time for the registry office; whereas. my mother was bouncing around the room making cups of tea and offering to bake cookies for Simon and the three plainclothes policemen.
“Of course you’ll stay,” Mum told them when they tried to back out. “You can’t come in here and scare us half to death and then do a runner.”
Geez. What movies were they showing at Sunny Days? Thelma and Louise? Bonnie and Clyde? Terminator 2?
“Stay there,” Simon said to me as he disentangled his arms from around my neck. “I’m just going to square it with the boys and then I’ll be back to punish you some more.”
I grinned up at him. “Does that mean you brought your handcuffs along with you?” And then I remembered we weren’t alone in the house so couldn’t indulge in foreplay or nookie.
Frustrated, I sank down into a lounge chair and watched the chaos escalate around me. If my mother had her way, we’d have a police escort to the registry office with not only one witness but half the police force in attendance. I could hear her inviting them back for a party the next day, when my mobile rang.
I sighed as I picked up. What now?
It was Megan.
“Dani, get over here. Now,” she said and I rolled my eyes. So much for locking myself inside the house until the killer was caught. “I’ve been digging into Sweet Lips Barbarella’s past and it seems like our girl wasn’t so sweet, after all.”
“What have you found out?”
“I can’t tell you over the phone. I’ll tell you when you get here.”
“But Megan, I can’t. My mother—”
“Yes, you can. As well as the information on Sweet Lips, I have something very important to show you.”
I looked up. The room was starting to thin out. Evidently the three policemen had resisted my mother’s charms and left. Simon was loosening Henry’s bow tie while Mum spoon-fed him hot sweet tea.
Covering the phone with one hand, I asked my mother what time she and Henry were due to get married.
“Five thirty, sweetie, which means you’d better hurry and have a shower. We can’t be late or we might miss our booking. At our age it’s not always possible to reschedule.” She placed the empty cup on the table next to her and began giving Henry a neck and shoulder rub. “Oh, by the way, I was wondering if you could drop us off at that flash new hotel at Williamstown afterwards. You know, ‘The Lodge.’ Henry and I have reserved the honeymoon suite for the night. I hear there’s complimentary champagne and room service.” She tickled Henry under the chin and then kissed him on the nose. “Should be a gas, hey Henry?”
Henry didn’t appear to have the energy to return her enthusiasm, but his color was definitely improving.
“Of course I can take you to Williamstown,” I told her and returned to my phone call. “Megan, how about seven o’clock?” I could drop in and see Megan after the ceremony finished and on the way to “The Lodge”. Whatever my assistant sex therapist had to show me, shouldn’t take long. Henry and Mum could always canoodle in the back seat of my car while they waited outside.
“And Dani, keep this meeting to yourself,” Megan said, and I decided not to tell her about Mum and Henry getting married after all. “If the wrong person finds out what I unearthed today—it could be dangerous for both of us.”
“Dangerous? What do you mean?”
“Seven o’clock. And don’t be late!”
I tossed the phone aside as though it was covered in bull ants and got to my feet. Already today, I’d broken the law with illegal entry, I’d eyeballed a dead guy with part of his face missing, I’d been asked to be a witness at
my mother’s wedding, I’d been threatened by three gunmen…and now Megan was cracking a whip and waving the word, dangerous in my face.
When all I really wanted to do was spend some time alone with Simon…
I started to let out a long drawn-out sigh of frustration and suddenly thought better of it. Squeezing my legs together and jigging up and down, I waddled off to the bathroom instead.
Nature couldn’t be put off any longer.
22
Friday, 4:45 p.m.
“Gotta go, darlin’,” said Simon who was waiting in my bedroom when I padded naked, except for a skimpy towel, out of the shower. He looked good. More than good. He looked edible. Hair tousled, the three top buttons of his shirt open and the beginnings of a five o’clock shadow cresting his rock star jaw. Yeah, definitely edible. “I’d like to hang around,” he went on, “but Joe rang. Not happy that I ducked out of work without letting him know.”
I shook my damp hair from my eyes and sidled up to him, pouting like I’d seen those sexy models do in the magazine section of the Tribute. “Not even time for a kiss before you go?”
His wicked grin made my legs melt. “Always time for a kiss,” he promised, waggling his eyebrows. “Especially when you’re dressed in nothing but a towel.”
He ran one finger over my pouting lips, tracing the outline, and then leaned forward and slowly covered my lips with his hot mouth. I moaned. Felt an ache gathering between my legs. I could spend the rest of my life kissing this man. His mouth spoke of heat and desire and sex and when the kiss deepened and our tongues tangled and caressed—the heat in my groin turned to fire.
It was like a splash of cold water when he pulled away from me. I closed my eyes.
“Oh, God, Dani,” Simon gasped, his breath coming in short sharp bursts. “What are you trying to do—kill me?”
I opened my eyes and smiled at him.
“Suddenly, whenever I’m near you, you turn me on like one of those giant firework displays. It’s interfering with my perfectly good boring life.”
My smile widened.
“But I still have to go,” he insisted and I lost the smile. “Joe’s waiting for my editorial so the paper can be wrapped up for the day.”
Damn…time for another tack.
“Henry’s making an honest woman of my mother in less than an hour. You don’t want to miss that.”
“Sorry, Dani. If your mother had given me prior notice, I’d have asked for the time off. But I’ll be out of a job if I don’t go back to the Tribute…” He glanced at his watch. “…now!”
Okay, time to bring out the big guns.
Exposing all my imperfections without a qualm…I dropped my towel to the floor.
And grinned as Simon’s breathing grew more and more ragged and his eyes caressed my body as though it was an ice cream he longed to lick.
“Oh God, Dani. You’re not playing fair,” he moaned and reached for my breasts.
Bingo!
“Looks like something’s come up,” I pointed out, all innocence, as I watched his erection strain against the crutch of his trousers.
“Okay,” he growled, his eyes turning black. “I can see you’re asking for more punishment.”
“Who me?” I asked, blatantly turning my back on him to slowly bend over and push my naked butt in the air, while picking the wet towel up from the floor.
Before I’d even sent the message to my brain to straighten up again, his arms were wrapped around me, pulling my buttocks up against his erection, which was acting like a missile-finding probe behind me.
“That’s it, Summers! You are in big trouble,” he told me, one hand unzipping his fly while he tore at a condom packet with his teeth. “No time for preliminaries,” he added, and holding me from behind, bent me over the bed.
Then the conversation closed down completely. His fingers, long and supple and oh-so-skillful, played music between my legs until heat and sensation took over and I could barely stand. Sensing my readiness, he plunged inside me while I pressed the palms of my hands on the bed and arched my back in compliance.
“And now I’m going to screw your brains out,” Simon warned, his voice a low growl in his throat.
“Ooh, I love it when you talk dirty,” I told him, squirming against him with approval.
“Dani? Everything alright in there?” my mother called from the kitchen.
“Yeah, Mum. Fine.” I panted and moaned as Simon kept his word and drove harder and harder, banging and slapping against me with every thrust.
“You’d better hurry, dear,” my mother added. “We should be leaving for the registry office in—”
“Ooooh, yeah!” I yelled as I came and the heat of my orgasm burst into flames all around me.
“Sshh.” Simon’s hand covered my mouth and we giggled like teenagers and toppled onto the bed together, legs and arms tangled.
“Er…I’ll leave you to it then,” said Mum after a short pause. “But tell Simon that Joe’s been on the phone again. And…er…time’s ticking away, you know.”
“Oh, God, how am I ever going to face your mother again?” groaned Simon and I laughed at his little-boy expression. “Do you know if she’s going to stick around here for long?”
“After we finish at the registry office I’m dropping the pair of them off at The Lodge, in Williamstown, so we’ll have the place to ourselves when you come back tonight.”
“Thank God.” And then Simon frowned. “Why The Lodge?”
“They’ve booked themselves into the honeymoon suite there,” I told him. “But I have to call in at Megan’s place on the way. She said she’s got something to show me.”
“Right.” Simon swung his legs off the bed and stood up. He smiled down at me, his lopsided grin making me want to crawl inside of him. “Okay, my darlin’. Until tonight,” he said and bent to kiss my belly button, before zipping up his fly.
* * *
Mum, Henry and I arrived at the registry office with two minutes to spare.
Mum was nervous. You could tell by the way she slipped her hand into the pocket of Henry’s suit coat every few minutes to check that he hadn’t lost the ring. Henry, on the other hand, looked quite chipper. Thanks to a quarter bottle of brandy which Simon had thoughtfully procured earlier to replace the hot tea.
A sign on the scarred registry-office door declared, “No dogs allowed. No drugs. No alcohol. Turn off all mobile phones. No swearing. You are on camera.” Underneath that, another sign declared, “Welcome. Enjoy your day.”
Go figure.
Switching off my mobile, I dropped it into my pocket and trudged behind Mum and Henry to the desk at the far end of the room. Surprisingly it was a very basic desk. Probably bought from Cash Converters or eBbay. Undeterred by his stark surroundings, Henry parked his walker against the wall and slipped his hand into Mum’s.
“Ready?” he whispered.
“Whenever you are, Henry.”
Behind the basic desk sat a bird-like woman, head down, shuffling papers. “Henry Baxter and Gwendolyn Summers?”
“That’s us,” said Mum, and my insides went all gooey when she smiled at Henry and squeezed his hand.
The woman glanced up, her bureaucratic smile set in place, took in the age of her next customers and I watched her smile falter. “Um…you are here to be married?”
“Yes, love,” agreed Henry, anxiously peering at the woman’s face through the lens of his coke-bottle thick glasses. “We are in the right department, aren’t we? I thought there’d be a few streamers and balloons to mark the event.” He swiveled his head around to Mum for confirmation. “Didn’t you, Gwenny?”
“Yes,” Mum said, and gave the room a quick once-over. “You know, it wouldn’t hurt to brighten this place up a bit,” she told Bird-woman. “Like, arrange some nice cut flowers in a vase and put some romantic music on the sound system and—”
Bird-woman coughed and shuffled her papers again. “Can we please get on with this? I have another couple to marry be
fore six o’clock.” She stretched one arm out and drew a sheet of paper from the pile on the desk toward her. “Now, I have a few questions I need to ask before we can proceed.”
“Shoot,” said Mum.
“Fire your best shot,” said Henry.
I cringed. Note to self—next time I go to the Mall, buy some corny DVDs with a G-level rating for the residents of Sunny Days. Something with cute doggies, singing tap dancers and smiling women in dirndl skirts.
“Henry Thomas Baxter and Gwendolyn Danielle Summers; are you both in agreement of this marriage?”
“Of course.”
“Wouldn’t be here if we weren’t.”
“Are either of you under the age of—” Bird-woman looked up, rolled her eyes and zeroed in on the next question on her list. “Are either of you involved with—”
Suddenly, she tossed the paper aside, shrugged both shoulders and gave us the first genuine smile of our visit. “To hell with the questions—let’s rumble,” she said and undid the top button of her cardigan.
Ten minutes later, Henry Thomas Baxter and Gwendolyn Danielle Summers had been joined together as husband and wife, Bird-woman was shaking hands and patting backs, and I had myself a brand new stepdad.
* * *
On the drive to Megan’s, I asked Mum if she and Henry planned to shift into a new house now they were married.
Mum seemed genuinely taken aback at my question, but didn’t answer immediately.
“Oh no, we love it at Sunny Days—don’t we, Gwenny?” Henry chirped, and in my rearview mirror I saw him lean over and kiss her on the cheek.
“Of course we do, darling,” Mum assured Henry and then went on to explain the situation to me. “You have to realize, dear…if we lived on our own, Henry and I wouldn’t have time for the fun stuff in life. We’re not youngsters any more. Our aim in life now is to make whoopee while the sun’s still shining, as they say.”
“Whoopee!” echoed Henry and I wondered whether Simon had given him just a tad too much brandy.
“At Sunny Days,” Mum continued, “everything gets done for us. There’s no shopping to worry about. No housework. No mowing lawns. Gawd no! The only shifting we’ll be doing is into a double room in the couples section of the facility.”