“Grandma, he kissed you!”
* * *
“You’re late, Sam.” Rachel stood in the doorway, balancing first on one foot, then the other, while adjusting the heel straps of her sandals.
Sam waited in the outside entry, the euphoria of his trip with Lillian and Jennifer fading with his ex-wife’s accusatory tone. “I left you a message.”
“I didn’t get it.”
“You didn’t check.” He glanced past her into the house. “Is Ben ready?”
“He’s changed clothes at least four times that I’m aware of and spent more time in front of the mirror than I do.” She smoothed a hand along the side of her too-tight, blood-red sheath dress, the hem stopping mid-thigh. Her gaze drifted from his scuffed shoes to his unshaven face. “Whatever the two of you are doing tonight, you’re going to be under dressed.”
Sam’s heart fell into his stomach. Ben hadn’t told his mother about the date with Kiesha. “Ben got an A on his history test. We’re celebrating.”
“It’s an A minus, but I’m glad he’s trying harder. Your influence, no doubt.”
So, Ben hadn’t told her about studying with Kiesha either. Though Ben probably kept any number of secrets from his mother, Sam didn’t like being dropped by surprise into the middle of one of them. Nor did he want a compliment from Rachel accompanied by sour grapes.
“I have it on good authority that an A minus is still an A. It’s certainly better than the D’s he’s been getting.”
“I suppose—”
“And while I’d love to take the credit for this miraculous change in our son’s study habits, I can’t. At least, not entirely.”
“What do you mean?”
“There’s a girl.”
“A girl? He’s only twelve.”
“Ben is in the seventh grade and soon to be thirteen. He’s a lot more grown up than either of us would like him to be. Girls are going to be a major part of his life from now on.”
“Why didn’t he tell me?”
Sam considered what to say that would smooth over her hurt feelings yet wouldn’t betray Ben. “I suppose it’s a guy thing. Daughters probably talk to their mothers. Sons confide in their dads. Though I have to admit I didn’t.”
“So, who is this girl?” The hurt was definitely there, just buried under a thick layer of arrogance.
“Her name is Kiesha Spencer. She’s a gymnast and in several of his classes at school. She’s been helping him study, which has obviously paid off, so he’s taking her to the Fall Festival dance at the school tonight. I’m merely the chauffeur.”
Rachel stared at him, her mouth open. Not the most attractive pose he’d ever seen her take. She was thirty-six and still a beautiful woman. Dark, curly hair, brown eyes framed by long, seductive lashes. Her almond-shaped eyes had been the feature he remembered most from their first meeting nearly fifteen years ago. She had just graduated from Radcliff, and he’d gone to a party at her sorority house where it had taken only minutes for those mysterious eyes of hers to captivate him.
Eyes were the windows to the soul, his mother had always told him. Too bad he hadn’t looked deeper into Rachel’s. Deeper, and a whole lot sooner.
They had dated for several months before flying to San Diego so she could introduce him to her parents. After enduring the cold, miserable winters of the northeast, the warmth of the San Diego area had appealed to him as nothing else could. Albert and Leah Marks had welcomed him into their family, if a bit skeptically.
However, their marriage hadn’t lasted. Rachel was used to having money, while he’d gone to college on a variety of scholarships, always planning to teach. After getting his California credentials, he accepted a position teaching math in a less appealing neighborhood high school where he also coached the soccer team. Though he’d loved every minute of it, Rachel had hated it. In order to please her and save his marriage, he’d gone to work for her father. Less than a year later, instead of ending what was rapidly becoming a loveless marriage, Rachel had become pregnant.
It had taken him two more years to realize why her eyes had lost their bewitching appeal. In their depths, he’d found only criticism and selfishness.
“And you didn’t feel this was something you should have discussed with me?”
Sam swallowed the angry words that had settled instantly on his tongue when he saw Ben approaching. Though frustrated, he didn’t want to argue with her in front of their son.
“Hey, Dad! Cool wheels.” Ben slipped around his mother and out the door. “Bye, Mom.”
“Wait just a minute, young man.” Rachel followed him out the door, nearly tripping over the welcome mat.
Ben halted next to Sam, then rolled his eyes skyward while he waited silently with his back turned toward his mother. Sam waited, too. Rachel did as she pleased with Ben, rarely consulting him unless there was a problem and then only to blame him for it. Even though he paid child support, she most often considered him a nuisance rather than Ben’s father. So, right now Sam wanted to see exactly how Ben was going to handle this.
“Why didn’t you ask me if you could take this girl to the school dance? I don’t know who she is.”
“Dad does. Besides, it’s his weekend. So, I asked him.”
Sam just shrugged, then smiled innocently when she scowled at him. Quite frankly, he couldn’t have said it better.
Chapter Fourteen
Ben figured he was the envy of every guy at the dance as he handed a plate of snacks and a soda to Kiesha. Kiesha was their fantasy girl, and here he was, actually the one to walk through the door tonight with her as his date. Of course, he owed that to his dad. No wheels, no date with Kiesha.
“Your dad is nice,” she said between bites of a chocolate chip cookie.
Ben swiped a potato chip from her plate. “You’re just saying that because he opened the car door for you and said you looked pretty.”
She smiled, her dark eyes gazing up at him shyly from beneath her long lashes. “Do you think I’m pretty?”
Ben felt his face grow warm. The chip he’d shoved into his mouth stuck in his throat, and he had to cough to clear it. “Yeah, sure.”
He especially liked that she didn’t use a ton of makeup like most of the other girls. No tattoos or extra body piercings—at least that he could see. Just the two little diamond studs in each earlobe. She had left her thick, black hair all curly and wore a short blue and yellow plaid skirt with a bright yellow top and a cropped denim jacket. Her shoes had low heels that put the top of her head level with his chin.
“This is my last day to eat things like this for awhile.” Kiesha held up the seven-layer nut bar and smiled brightly. “Tomorrow is braces day.”
“What do you need braces for?”
“My teeth are crooked.”
“I don’t think so.”
Though her two front teeth overlapped just a bit, to Ben she was the prettiest girl in the whole junior high school. She was his friend, and best of all, being with her helped him forget about his parents.
Kiesha handed him the nut bar. “You know, you’re really nice, too, Ben.”
“So are you.” He split the candy, giving her the larger piece. “Thanks for helping me with my classes. My parents were really bugging me about my grades.”
“I think that’s just something parents do.”
“Yours bug you, too?”
“Sure they do. I have to keep an A average or no gymnastics.”
Ben licked the caramel off his fingers. “Do you ever get the feeling that they’re holding all the things we want to do or have for ransom?”
Kiesha laughed. “By ransom, you mean good grades?”
“Yeah. Or good behavior. Or…” Ben raised his hands into the air. “…whatever. There’s always an ‘unless’ somewhere in the sentence.” Unconsciously, Ben took Kiesha’s hand and started walking toward the door. “Take my mom and dad, for instance. I want a skateboard, but unless I get good grades, I can’t have it. It’s just a trade.�
�
“Isn’t that what it usually is, though?”
“Yeah, but they never even asked me why my grades sucked in the first place.” Ben steered her toward one of the many concrete benches along the outside walkway.
“Do you know why?” Kiesha sat down and patted the place beside her.
Ben sat next to her, his hands folded and dangling between his knees. “Mom’s shrink says I’m just looking for attention.”
“Do you think that’s what you’re doing?”
Ben shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m their kid, but I feel like… like a soccer ball or the rope in a tug of war. Something my mom can use to get back at my dad for wanting the divorce. Sometimes I wonder if my dad ever wanted me to begin with.” He sighed, blinking the sudden wetness from his eyes. He had never talked about his feelings to anyone before. “This is dumb. They’ve been divorced for ten years. You’d think I’d be used to it by now.”
“No,” Kiesha whispered, then reached for Ben’s hand and squeezed it. “I don’t think kids ever get used to it.”
* * *
“Lenora texted me. She’s finished the mask. What do you want me to do?”
Manuel had expected the woman to be difficult. Only Carlos thought his body would be enough to persuade the girl to cooperate. Manuel had been in the real world long enough to know that a woman like this Lenora was a spider, waiting for the perfect fly to come along. But he had underestimated her stupidity. Having demanded five thousand American dollars up front, she was holding the mask for ransom. Another fifteen thousand or she would report them to the authorities. Foolish girl. She had no idea the magnitude of her mistake. Javier Rojas would gladly have paid the original request. Now…
“You will go see her, Carlos. Make sure the mask is identical to the original, then you will deal with her. No mistakes. No mercy. Is that understood?” Carlos nodded. “If I hear from her again, nephew of not, you will pay the price.”
* * *
Lillian sat in her mother’s barber chair and stared at her image in the wall mirror. Was it her imagination, or did the reflection look older than she felt?
Marie Thornton laughed while she wrapped a strip of tissue around Lillian’s neck. “No one likes what’s in the mirror. Including me.” She draped a plastic sheet across Lillian’s chest, snapping it tightly in place around the tissue. “However, you are aging beautifully.”
“Thanks, Mama.”
“You say the words like you don’t believe what I said. It’s true, you know. You are lucky to have your father’s bone structure and my skin. It could have been the other way around.” Marie pulled a brush through Lillian’s hair, her fingers sifting through the silken strands. “And that would have been a tragedy.”
Lillian sighed. Not such a tragedy, she thought. Gus had those opposite features and never lacked for female companionship, and it wasn’t because he’d been a wildcatter on an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico. He had always had his mother’s ability to talk a rabbit out of its skin. Or a woman out of her clothes. Still single and wildly handsome at forty-six, Gus Thornton had retired to Key West to spend his days scuba diving for sunken treasure, and knowing her little brother, Lillian was sure he wasn’t doing it alone.
“I need to do something with my hair, Mama. Maybe get rid of the gray.” Lillian studied her face, first one side, then the other. “What do you think?”
“So, who’s the man?”
“What?” Lillian’s heart nearly stopped. She should have known she couldn’t hide anything from her mother. Thank goodness, Jen was with her grandfather.
“You would not want to change your hair unless a man was involved.”
“How can you know that?”
“Because I am your mother, and a mother knows these things.” Marie turned the chair so that mother and daughter were facing each other. “Now tell me about him.”
Lillian hesitated. “Mama, I’m not sure there’s anything to tell.” Her mother merely crossed her arms and waited silently. “Really,” Lillian insisted.
“But thinking about not telling me makes you blush, so there is someone. Is he handsome?”
Her mother had the most uncanny way of ferreting out the truth. She would have made the perfect spy in Sam’s CIA scenario. “Yes.” Lillian glanced into the mirror, her face turning a deep shade of pink.
“Does he have a name?”
“Sam, but you mustn’t say anything in front of Jennifer. Promise me.”
“Amanda wants you to love only her father, always.” Marie turned the chair back to face the mirror and picked up the brush. “But you must listen to your own heart.”
“As you did, Mama?”
It was Marie’s turn to blush. “Your nonna and nonno were… skeptical, but my Pete won them over with his love for me. Do you love this Sam?”
Did she? She closed her eyes. Could still feel the brush of his lips against her cheek, see his smoldering gaze. Swallowing carefully, she cleared her throat. “I don’t know him all that well. I mean, we’ve never even dated. At least not a conventional type of date.” Her gaze met her mother’s in the mirror. “He’s my math professor.”
“How does he feel about you?”
“I’m not really sure, but I think he feels… something.” Then she told her mother all about Sam. Everything he’d said and done since the day they had met on the steps outside the Math and Sciences building.
Marie put her cheek next to Lillian’s and hugged her close. “I think your Sam cares for you. All you must do now is let the love grow.”
“There’s one other thing, Mama.” Lillian gazed into the mirror. “He’s quite a bit younger than I am.”
“How much?”
“Twelve years.”
Marie smiled. “Then yes, we must take out the gray, and I think a new cut. Something to frame those Norwegian cheekbones and make you feel as young as he is.”
* * *
Lillian rushed through her morning routine, and instead of concentrating her thoughts on her new hair style, she described the temperature of liquid gold in a compound inequality. How crazy was that for a woman whose previous abilities had consisted of golf, bridge and baby-sitting? But after spending two weeks in class studying chapters seven and eight—and nearly as much time catching up to them—she felt she was finally ready for today’s test.
Even the hospital had cooperated. No newborn babies had needed extra care, no crack babies had been born. She’d been able to spend the time since returning from Sacramento in quiet study. Reaching for the garage door opener, she took a deep, cleansing breath. Today she simply wanted to do well, to assure Sam that his time tutoring her had not been wasted. That she could learn.
Face it, Lillian. You want to dazzle him.
What else she would like to do to, or with, Sam vanished from her thoughts the instant she saw Amanda coming up the sidewalk with a determined look on her face. Lillian had returned Jennifer to Amanda’s house Monday morning as promised, but everything there had been in such utter chaos she hadn’t wanted to linger. What if Jennifer had mentioned Sam, and that was the reason for this visit? Her relationship with Sam was the last thing Lillian wanted to discuss with her daughter.
“Mother, are you going somewhere?”
Lillian glanced at her watch. “I have a class at 10:00.” It was only 9:14, but she had wanted to arrive early, have time for a quick review and a cup of the cafeteria’s awful coffee.
“I won’t keep you then. I was just going into San Diego to do some shopping and thought you might like to come along.”
It had been a long time since Amanda had suggested a shopping expedition, and since the invitation seemed quite genuine, Lillian almost regretted the fact that she wouldn’t be able to go with her. “Unfortunately, I have a test today, but if your trip can wait, I could go with you this afternoon.”
Amanda shook her head. “Jen gets out of school early this afternoon. Teacher work plan day. I suppose we could take Jen with us, but her idea of shopping
is Toys R Us.”
Lillian laughed. “Well, you and I can go some other time then.” Amanda’s quiet nod was not in character, and that worried Lillian more than her angry outbursts. “Is everything all right? Did you and Gregg have a nice weekend?”
Amanda’s gaze drifted past Lillian to rest on the oak tree at the opposite end of the house. “Do you remember the last time I sneaked out of my bedroom window to play in the branches of that tree?”
“You were ten.”
It was a bittersweet memory. Amanda had broken her arm in the fall, and rather than cut the tree down as he had threatened to do, Rusty had made her change bedrooms with Michael who was just six at the time. Some nonsense about boys being better able to handle tree climbing than girls. Lillian’s protest on behalf of both children had been ignored. However, Amanda hadn’t seemed to mind the change. At least at the time.
Because Rusty had remained home for the entire week, reading stories to her each night, Amanda had been ecstatic, even through all the pain. Then before he’d left for duty in the Gulf War, Rusty had signed his name on her cast. For many years, she’d kept the cast hidden in the bottom drawer of her dresser, finally throwing it away the night before she married Gregg.
“Well, the trip was kind of like that. Good parts and painful parts.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
Though Amanda smiled, the feeling did not quite reach her eyes. “We really had a nice time. Catalina Island was beautiful, the weather was beautiful, and Gregg was very thoughtful and attentive. Those were the good parts.”
“What part of all that could possibly have been painful?”
“He’s pressuring me to have another child which I don’t want to do.” Before Lillian could respond to that, Amanda turned angry eyes toward the tree. “And he wants me to forget my father.”
What could a mother say to that? “Sweetheart, I don’t think Gregg is asking you to do that. He just wants you to remember that he’s your husband and that he loves you, and Amanda, he needs to know that you love him, too. You can love both your father and your husband. It’s just that when you make it a competition, Gregg is afraid he’s losing.”
An Equation For Murder Page 10