by Lynn Rae
Shelly shifted her injured leg and changed tactics. “Regardless, Emily Fontaine isn’t the right sort of woman for you. It’s obvious why you would, ah, be interested in her like that. She’s so, ah…endowed. I was hesitant to hire her for that very reason.” Shelly paused and pulled at the hem of her shirt, and he repressed the urge to roll his eyes. Why did his sister think he was merely interested in Emily’s admittedly luscious exterior? And how could she have even considered discriminating against Emily based on her appearance? Hadn’t Shelly ever talked to Emily and gotten to know how wonderful she was?
“In a way, I’m glad this happened. It means you’re ready to start seeing people again. I know of a couple of women who would be perfect for you—”
“Absolutely not. Shouldn’t we be getting in the car and getting to city hall for this vital emergency meeting?” Hoping to change the subject, Paul glanced out the window like a cab might pull up at any moment. He was already estranged from his daughter; he didn’t want to create a feud with his sister. What he wanted was Emily, and she’d disappeared. Losing her seemed inevitable at this point, and the realization made his head hurt.
“We have plenty of time. You have to admit, she’s nothing like Karen. I don’t know what you see in her.”
“She’s kind and compassionate.”
“That’s not all she is.” Shelly shook her head once and gave him a knowing look. “You need someone decisive and strong. Look at how well you and Karen got along all those years. She kept everything going while you tinkered.”
Paul took a sip of coffee and waited for his irritation to calm before he replied. His tinkering had resulted in several lucrative patents and enough demand for his consulting that he could pick and choose. But in one way, Shelly was right. Karen had run his life for decades, and he’d been grateful for it. Her managing had allowed him to drift in his imagination and solve theoretical problems with no real-world distractions. His life was different now, he was different now, and Emily’s softer approach appealed to him with unexpected strength. She appreciated his help in a way Karen never would have.
“I’ve learned how to manage on my own.” And now I don’t want to be alone. Paul didn’t let that last declaration slip, since he’d just realized it sitting here in his sister’s perfect kitchen, undergoing an uncomfortable confrontation. He didn’t want to be alone, and he wanted Emily to be the person who saved him from it. “Emily’s physical appearance doesn’t mean she isn’t strong or intelligent.”
Shelly rose from her stool with a wince at his subtle jab and awkwardly limped to the cupboard where she pulled out a box of cookies and dumped a few on a plate. She handed him a napkin and pushed the plate his way. She was trying to soften him up with some of Mike’s sweets.
“It’s going to be awkward for me, and her, today. It’s a bad idea to mix business and pleasure, even if it’s once removed,” Shelly said as she leaned one elbow on the counter and adjusted her new knee. She didn’t pick up a cookie. Paul couldn’t recall the last time he’d seen his sister eat a nonnutritive calorie.
“She’ll manage, and I know you won’t treat her unfairly. She works hard and has accomplished a lot since she’s been here.” Paul wondered how he was going to be able to let Emily know about Shelly before the meeting started. He could try to text her, but his sister would notice, and there was no way he’d get the privacy to call unless he retreated to the bathroom.
“I suppose. The social media stuff she’s done is good, and she’s not irritating to be around like some folks.” Faint praise, but from Shelly, it was almost gushing approval. Paul picked up a cookie and took a bite as he nodded. Emily was the most pleasant person he’d ever met. Of course, that was probably infatuation and lust talking, but he was going to enjoy it while he could, if only he could track her down and get her to forgive him.
“Promise you won’t make her uncomfortable.”
“Fine. I’ll be my usual self. No commentary or gossip. Heaven knows I don’t need any extra speculation about anyone in my family when I’m planning my campaign. Besides, this situation with the statue is important enough I don’t really have much interest in dealing with her.” Shelly leaned closer and caught his gaze with her own steady one. “Paul, I have to be frank. She’s so much younger than you. Seventeen years. It looks really bad. It is really bad.”
“She is younger.” Paul didn’t meet Shelly’s eyes as he twisted his coffee cup a quarter turn. Emily seemed unconcerned when they’d discussed it, but he knew the difference mattered, would matter even if they could work through today’s events. When Shelly said the number of years that separated them, it did sound insurmountable.
“You’ve talked about it? Really talked about it? You were with Karen all those years, so you’re not exactly experienced at this new relationship stuff. Don’t you wonder what she sees in you?”
“What, you think she has ulterior motives?” The idea was absurd. Just because he hadn’t dated a lot didn’t mean he’d be spellbound by the attentions of beautiful young woman. Even though he was.
“It’s just kind of a cliché: widower meets younger woman, who wraps him around her finger, and the next thing he knows, she’s taken him for everything he has. You have a lot more than she does, Paul. I know exactly how much money she’s making.”
Paul sipped his coffee to help wash down his irritation. He wished fervently for the clock to move ahead so they could go to the meeting, as awkward as it was sure to be. At least when they were there, Shelly wouldn’t be talking about personal things. “She isn’t taking me for anything. She’s never even hinted. Besides, after what Courtney put her through, she might never want to see me again, and your problems are solved.”
Shelly raised a skeptical eyebrow but didn’t continue on that topic. “Be responsible, and don’t trust her if she says she’s handling the birth control. You don’t want get her pregnant, because you’ll owe her money for the next eighteen years if you do.”
“Christ, what a thing to say.” Paul shook his head and stood up, his patience with this insulting inquisition at an end. He was also worried that he and Emily hadn’t discussed such a basic topic before they’d made love. What if…no. Shelly seemed to realize she’d gone too far, and she stood and placed a hand on his arm.
“Sorry, Paul. I shouldn’t have said that. No, that’s not true, it needed to be said.” She took a breath and tilted her head in a way so eerily similar to their mother’s he lost his train of thought for a second. “This has all happened so quickly. I’m worried. If anyone had ever said you’d get involved with a woman, a much, much younger woman, after knowing her for a few weeks, I’d have laughed in her face. It’s just not like you. It makes me think going through some sort of self-destructive phase.”
“You think I’m having a midlife crisis?”
“Maybe. Courtney’s left home, you lost your wife, and you’re facing your own mortality. You have a fancy red car, and now you’ve got a young girlfriend with big—”
“Don’t be crude, Shelly. It’s tacky.” Emily wasn’t even his girlfriend. Would she even want to be?
Shelly inhaled a quick breath and looked down her nose at him. “You know you’d be saying the same things to me if the tables were reversed.”
She had a point, but that didn’t make any of it less irritating. Emily wasn’t some symbol of his desperation not to fade into old age. From the outside it might seem that way, but he knew in his soul this was different.
“Just be cautious. Ease back, let everyone get used to the idea. That’s all I ask.”
“Sure, sis; you know I’m always careful.” Paul pushed at his coffee mug with the tip of his finger. He’d been cautious for years and years, and when he’d opened himself up to life again, everything had exploded into painful chaos.
Shelly must have sensed some of his distress, because her expression softened. “You really like her, don’t you?”
He nodded, too stressed to reply, and she wrapped her arm around his shoul
ders in an unexpected and uncharacteristic hug. “Okay. I’m not going to say anything else about it, at least for today. That’ll give everyone a cooling-off period.”
Paul gave a rueful chuckle. “Sounds good.”
Shelly nodded and released him, tottering a bit before she leaned against the stone counter. “Are you coming to the Halloween party?”
“May I bring a guest?” If Emily wasn’t welcome, he wasn’t going to participate. If Courtney was there, it was going to be uncomfortable, but she’d have to learn to deal with it.
“If you absolutely have to. I’ll be on my best behavior.” Shelly gave him a gentle tap with her hand. “Would you slide my laptop over here? I want to check the webpage, and see how many comments we’ve gotten about the statue. That way I’ll have a better idea of how to spin things at the meeting.”
Paul retrieved her computer from the other end of the island and ate another cookie as Shelly booted up. He was curious too, although he’d rather pull out his phone to see if Emily had called or texted. Maybe she was running errands and too busy to call. He decided not to consider the possibility she was avoiding him already, or that she was crying her eyes out somewhere far from home.
Shelly made a distressed sound, and Paul glanced over at her, worried her knee was bothering her.
“Oh, no. No, no, no.”
Paul stood up and came over to look at the screen. Instead of the city website’s familiar banner, Shelly was looking at the blue-and-white screen of Facebook. Courtney’s avatar, of her posing sunglasses and a ball cap, was at the top left and a long stream of comments scrolled down her page. Taking a deep breath, dread filling him, and Paul leaned in to read.
It was vile. That was the word that kept echoing in Paul’s mind as he read his daughter’s comments about Emily, and her friends’ vicious pile-on. His daughter had initially posted how upset she was to find a strange woman in her house, and then her friends chimed in with increasingly vulgar speculations which Courtney had the bad sense to confirm. It was all there; that they’d been in bed, been naked; one had even gleefully speculated about Emily’s early morning “walk of shame” being a just punishment for sluts. That last statement made Paul a little nauseated. Had Emily felt used like that?
Shelly reached up and covered her mouth with one hand as she scrolled the screen down with the other. It went on, twenty or more statements and replies ranging from variations on the word slut, to calls for someone to find out who the “naked fat whore” was and slap her.
“Who made that threat?” Paul peered at the screen and wished he had his reading glasses.
“Uh, Jules Straker.” Shelly’s voice was low and intent. “Her mother’s in Rotary with me. She should know better. I don’t think she’d actually do anything; they’re just blowing off steam. These girls don’t have good sense when it comes to posting things like this. They think it’s as inconsequential as squealing about a new nail-polish color.”
He thought that was bullshit. Even if these girls had no intention of coming within forty feet of Emily, the things they were posting on a public forum were threatening and intimidating. He couldn’t understand why Courtney would initiate such a discussion. At least they didn’t know Emily’s name. Yet. A terrible thought intruded on his shocked reading.
“Can Emily see this?”
“Not unless she’s a friend of Courtney, which I’m sure she’s not.”
“Or unless someone sends her a link or screenshot or whatever.” Courtney had a lot of virtual friends, and it was possible there might be some overlap with people who also knew Emily. She’d be devastated if she found out.
“Shelly, I have to go. Go find her.”
“Who, Courtney or Emily?”
Emily’s stomach felt like she’d swallowed a large glass of lemonade too quickly, cold, sour, and ready to turn over. She was seated at the familiar, long laminated table in the municipal building conference room, in the chair in the far corner, hoping to remain unnoticed by Shelly, Dave, and Roger. Perhaps also by Paul, she hadn’t managed to meet his gaze longer than the half second she’d allowed herself when she’d entered the room and found him there with his sister. It had been a shock to see Shelly at the head of the table, back on her throne and ready to solve the great mystery of Corporal Peter Ellison’s missing head. With her there, Emily hadn’t managed the will to do more than say hello to Shelly and Paul before she retreated to her unobtrusive seat. Dave and Roger had ambled in soon after, and any opportunity to speak with Paul had disappeared just like her confidence.
The sudden urge to check her phone was an itch she couldn’t scratch, but it would be incredibly unprofessional to access the device during the meeting. Shelly would notice and frown on such behavior. With a sigh, Emily turned back to her laptop and made a few notes as Shelly read through the police report. The icon for her e-mail beckoned from her taskbar and she considered opening it. No one would know, but had Paul even sent her an e-mail? Judging by the agonized look he’d given her when she’d stepped into the meeting room, he wanted to talk. She’d been too upset to check her phone that morning after leaving him and when she’d thought about it, she’d felt like crying and had ignored the device, not sure if she wanted to know if he’d called or not.
Shelly moved on to giving everyone an update on how the media was covering the incident, and since she’d gotten her information from the report Emily had sent her earlier, there was no need to listen. With a flick of her fingertip, she opened her e-mail and dismissed the sales notices from various retailers. One from her brother, his usual weekly checkin she could skip until Monday, another from a college friend she hadn’t seen in a year, and then, finally, one from Paul. He’d sent it a half an hour ago, just before the meeting commenced.
Swallowing hard and willing her nausea to subside, she opened it, prepared for him to dive right into a breakup with her. Instead, it was terse and to the point.
Emily,
I’m so sorry about this morning and I want to see you. Courtney told Shelly about what happened.
Paul
It was a punch to the gut, and she realized she must have made a sound of pain, because everyone’s head swiveled her way. Flinching under the annoyed gazes of Shelly, Roger, and Dave, she struggled for a response.
“Sorry to interrupt. I, ah, just bit my tongue.”
Shelly nodded once and went back to her agenda, Dave and Roger paying rapt attention. Paul stared at her, and as she looked at his dark eyes, her tears threatened to emerge yet again. He shook his head lightly, and the intensity of his gaze made her tremble. Was he angry with her?
Gusting out a breath, she looked away, peering at his brief message and trying to discern any meaning between the lines. The letters swayed on the screen, and she blinked.
“So, that’s basically it. We have a major problem, no ideas how to solve it, and no money for repairs.” Shelly concluded the dire litany with a sigh and peered around the table. “Any suggestions?”
A full beat of silence greeted her. Dave and Roger shifted in their seats as they cleared their throats. Emily doubted they’d gotten involved in this committee with the expectation they’d be dealing with something of this magnitude. She risked a glance at Paul to find he was still staring at her, and she felt her cheeks flame. It might have been embarrassment or remembering how wonderful his skin felt against hers, but whatever the cause, having that reaction in front of Shelly was very uncomfortable.
“Offer a reward?” Dave said in a hesitant voice.
“Yeah, but how much? And how would we make the drop? That’s what they call it, a drop, right?” Roger turned to his friend with a frown.
“I don’t know, arrange some sort of exchange in a parking lot at midnight. That’s how they do it in the movies.” Dave nodded his head at the notion.
“This isn’t the movies, you two.” Shelly’s voice cut in with a snap that made Emily jump. “But a reward might work. I hate to think of how long it would take and the cost to get a re
placement made.”
“How much?” Paul’s quiet question compelled her to look at him. He was watching the other two men and this left her free to study his profile. She ached to kiss him again.
Dave and Roger hemmed and hawed for a few seconds, shrugging their shoulders at each other like they were communicating in code.
“Maybe, I don’t know, in the neighborhood of a thousand dollars?” Roger said with raised eyebrows. Dave nodded agreement.
“A thousand dollars? I’d never get approval for that much,” Shelly said and leaned back in her chair with a squeak of the casters. Her knee was probably aching by now.
“We can chip in, isn’t that right, Roger?” Dave nodded with enthusiasm. “How about you, Paul? If we each cough up three hundred thirty-three bucks, we’re golden.”
Emily watched Paul shrug. “I don’t have a problem with it. How would we communicate with them?”
“An ad in the paper, maybe get on the radio and explain things.” Dave’s voice lit up with enthusiasm.
“I don’t like the idea of making our situation so public,” Shelly said.
“Come on, everybody already knows about it. I saw pictures up online earlier this morning,” Roger said.
“Anybody who walks by the park is going to see that yellow tarp wrapped around him and put it together.” Dave nodded sagely at his accomplice. “It’s kind of eye-catching.”
Shelly sighed and pressed her fingers to her forehead. “Fine. You can offer up a reward as private citizens. I can’t funnel the money through the city budget; the commissioners would blow their collective gaskets. Emily?”
She jerked when Shelly called out her name, startled from her relatively safe perch in the corner. Everyone looked at her, and she studiously avoided making eye contact with Paul.
“Can you come up with some sort of notice we can put on the webpage? Maybe a press release, too?”
“Absolutely. Sure.” She nodded her head and ducked back behind her laptop’s screen to open a blank document. Nothing came to mind as she stared at the white screen. Lost, one large bronze head, reward, didn’t sound official enough.