by Rita Lakin
“Book signing. Of course he asked me to go with him, but I said no. And he was relieved.”
“That was the right thing to do. Don’t want him to feel trapped.” She butters the bread.
“Didn’t you eat?” I move dishes around to make room for her.
“Sort of. It’s Joe’s turn to cook. He makes the worst liver and onions ever. Have you ever tasted gray cardboard and unidentifiable shrunken charcoal? Yuk.”
“So why do you let him cook?”
“Because I don’t want him to get into his old habit of taking me for granted. My poor stomach. Got any Tums?”
She gets up and goes into my kitchen. “Never mind, I know where you keep them. Maybe on his cooking nights we should go out to eat. No, let him work. So, I’ll suffer.”
I start clearing the table. Evvie helps me. “What do you think? Should I be jealous?”
Evvie considers this. “Not yet. It’s just the newness of the situation. Do you trust him, Glad?”
“I think so. Rather, I thought so. Never in my wildest imagination would I have expected this. Competition? Ridiculous! At our age?”
“No ring on her finger, huh?”
“Nope. Lots of expensive jewelry. No wedding ring.”
“Try not to worry. It’ll work out.” But I see her cross her fingers like we did when we were kids and were lying.
At the sink, I scrape the hardly eaten food from the plates. “She’s much younger. She’s gorgeous. She’s obviously rich. Probably very talented and travels in high literary circles. And they were once in love with one another. Now he’s running around like a chicken without its head. Should I worry?”
Evvie stands near the stove nibbling at the stir-fry out of my wok.
“You’re taking too long to answer me,” I admonish her from where I’m stacking the dishes in the dishwasher.
Evvie laughs. “Remember that famous hysterically funny line from an old Jack Benny radio show? When this robber holds him up with a gun and says, ‘Your money or your life.’ And cheap Jack Benny says … ”
I join in the punch line with her:
“‘I’m thinking. I’m thinking.’”
Evvie and I hug each other. What would I do without my sister?
Jack listens to Colette explain that it’s almost closing time in the book room. “During the day,” she tells him, “this room is packed. Booksellers from all over Florida and adjoining states are selling books by the attending writers. There are only a few people making last-minute buys right now, so you can imagine what this room is like when these booths are jammed with readers.”
He straightens his tie as he watches Michelle and Colette retrieve copies of Bonbon, Non Non! from a tall bookshelf. Michelle stands on the ladder and hands books down to her niece. Jack, wanting to help, stacks the cart with the books Colette hands to him.
“I’d be happy to change places with you,” he offers Michelle.
Michelle smiles down at him. “Thank you, but it is not necessary. I am used to rickety ladders all over the world.”
Colette shakes her head in dismay. “What I never get used to is my controlling aunt who has to do everything herself. Does it make sense that she should climb the ladder, when it’s obvious that a much younger, more agile me should be doing this silly job? And even more preposterous when a very able male like you could do it easier. A handsome man with whom she could be relaxing and having a cocktail instead.”
Michelle laughs, and with a tingle, Jack remembers how that throaty, sexy sound turned him on years ago.
“She’s right, you know,” he says.
Michelle steps down and rearranges the books on the cart to her satisfaction. “I am a businesswoman, and to run a successful business, I make sure I know everything is done exactly the way I want it.”
Colette shrugs. “And drives her publishers crazy. She doesn’t know how to delegate, even though I am her only assistant and PR person and vice president of her company.”
Michelle hugs her and says deprecatingly, “Ma petite, you exaggerate. Come, let us set up before my eager fans arrive.”
Colette addresses Jack. “Tell me, how am I to learn the business when all she does is keep secrets from me? Have you ever heard of an author who never lets her closest in command even see her manuscript as she writes it? Not a word said, not a clue. Not even a charming sentence to whet the appetite. All locked up in her laptop and not one word seen until finished.” She points to the small briefcase hanging from Michelle’s shoulders. “And I might add, a laptop that never leaves her side for a moment.”
Jack doesn’t want to get between these two. He shrugs and takes a wild guess. “Maybe Michelle finds it necessary not to ruin her concentration when she writes.”
Michelle shifts her shoulder strap and puts her arm through Jack’s. “You see,” she says to Colette, “he understands the author’s need to keep solely in touch with her muse.”
Colette pouts. “Sometimes I think she should write spy novels. She has the paranoid mind for it.”
Michelle moves past the book cart and indicates it to Colette. “I am giving over control to you. Right now. You can wheel the cart all by yourself.” They all laugh.
“And so, after three months of living with the Marais brothers in Ghent, I had enough material for this exposé. And now here it is.” Michelle hefts the book. “And here I am. And soon the brothers will be eating jailhouse food. No more chocolat for them. Not even their own scandalous marzipan. I thank you very much for attending.”
Jack, sitting next to Colette in the front row, watches proudly as the small meeting room erupts with applause from the audience.
The questions begin.
A voice in back calls out, “How did the brothers not know it was you, madame? You are famous everywhere.”
Michelle smiles. “Voilà!” She waves her bracelet-filled arms. “Not the way I come to them. No jewelry. Poorly bleached hair of an unattractive color. Cheap clothes. A poignant, made-up story which flatters men into revealing their secrets. Nerves of steel. And, last but not least, professional acting lessons.”
The audience loves her. And the questions continue on. Colette whispers to Jack, “This happens everywhere we go. If she let them, they’d keep her here for hours.”
Jack surreptitiously looks at his watch.
Fortunately, Michelle wraps up the Q&A and signing in an hour. As the last fan leaves, Jack attempts to wheel the cart, but this time Colette insists she is capable of returning the few unsold books back to the book room without his help. Taking it from him, off she goes, calling over her back, “Your dinner is waiting.”
Michelle admits to starvation and thirst. She tells Jack she can never eat before a lecture. Jack walks her to the elevator. He’s about to take leave of her when she says, “A nightcap? For a few minutes. Besides, I like having company when I eat.”
Jack hesitates, then agrees. “All right, a nightcap for just that—a few minutes. I’d like to discuss your safety one more time.”
When they reach the top floor Jack looks around Michelle’s luxurious Mediterranean-style suite. A tray is set, waiting for her on the large white coffee table with its seashell border. Sandwiches, fruit, cheese, and wine, ordered earlier by the efficient Colette, Michelle informs him.
No doubt she is considered a star to rate this, thinks Jack as he looks around.
“Care to join me?” she asks.
“No, thanks, I had a big meal before I came.”
“At least some wine?”
“I shouldn’t. I have to drive home.”
She smiles, looking at the label of the bottle. “Good, this is from a fine French winery. Not the one I intend to destroy in my next exposé.”
Michelle kicks her high heels off. She tosses her briefcase on the desk, then removes her jacket and plops down on the couch, tucking her legs in under her. Her low-cut silk blouse flutters with the movement. She starts to laugh as she reaches for some Camembert and a small sesame thin wafe
r.
“What?” Jack sits down near her and pours himself a drink from a carafe of water.
“I was remembering a night when it was I who drank too much wine and you had to drive us home. Remember?”
He smiles. He realizes he remembers every detail of that month he spent with her. “How could I forget?”
“You had to drive my car and you weren’t familiar with the controls and it was very dark. You were swerving as you had trouble with the stick shift.”
Jack, caught up in her story, absently pours himself some wine. “And the gendarme on the motorcycle pulled us over.”
“And he repeatedly shouted at you and all you could say was Je ne parle français.”
“I remember poking you to help me out, but you pretended to be asleep.”
“And the policeman got angrier and angrier and more frustrated.”
They are both laughing hard now. “I was so irritated that you didn’t help me out. Until you told me later all the horrible things the cop was saying.”
“He called you an idiot and insulted you because you were an American and because you didn’t have the decency to learn our language. And he accused you of being drunk because you were wobbling across the highway. And he wanted you to follow him to the police station. He finally gave up and called you stupid and drove off.”
“You were so right not to let him know you understood him. You saved me from a long night of explanations that wouldn’t be believed.”
“You would not have liked French jails.”
The laughter stops.
“About Colettte’s comment. I must defend myself,” Michelle says, reaching across him to take the wine bottle out of his hand. Jack suddenly feels he is too close to her. Her perfume reaches his nostrils. Her bodice is too revealing.
Michelle, seemingly unaware, says, “Colette was too harsh. I keep my manuscript well hidden for safety, because there are too many people who would like to know who my poisoned pen will destroy next. If any pages were left around, they would invariably find themselves in the wrong hands. Someone who will sell them in advance to some magazine or the Internet. For example, my next manuscript contains information that will destroy a winery in Bordeaux. Information has probably leaked out already, but if the vineyard owners ever saw what I wrote, they’d be at the lawyers immediately, trying to stop the publication. What could be worse?”
Jack shakes his head. “What would be much worse is that someone might kill you to be rid of you for what you write in your books. You are more protective of your work than your life.”
She shrugs. “What am I to do? Hire bodyguards and have no privacy in my life?”
“You take too many risks.”
She reaches closer to him and refills her empty glass. “And what life isn’t filled with risks?” She shifts slightly; her body leans against his chest. Her voice softens. “Ah, Jacques, I have missed you.”
Jack leaps up, afraid he’s not thinking clearly. “I must go. It’s late.”
“I’m sorry. I should not have said that.”
He watches her gracefully unravel herself and rise, too, reminding him of a satisfied, well-fed Siamese cat. “Of course you must,” she agrees smiling, knowing how she affects him.
At the open door, he feels clumsy and tongue-tied. “Please be careful. Use all the locks and bolts. You have my card. If you need any help, call me.”
She gives him a delicate kiss on his forehead. “Your wish is my command.” Then she tilts her head. “Wait,” she says, turning and hurrying to her briefcase. She takes out a copy of her book. “This is for you. I hope you find it interesting.”
Jack takes the book, thanks her, and practically dashes to the elevator. What a clod he is! How badly he’s handling this situation. And he doesn’t understand why.
The Snake waits patiently. He feels it is his finest attribute. He never tires. Although he complains to himself, wondering why he agreed to this silly job. But family is family. And to tell the truth, he’s enjoying this petite vacation from retirement. Like riding on the bike, he thinks as he smiles, one never forgets.
Aha! His virtue is rewarded. He sees the top of that lovely mane of red from the light in the hallway as his mark unlocks the door and pushes the book cart into the room. Her head is bent down, engrossed in reading a book as she walks. She is startled when she attempts to turn on the lights and they don’t go on. She clicks the switch a few more times. Then she slides into the dark room anyway. He can almost read her mind as she stands in the aisle between the booths. Should she go back outside and find someone on staff to help her? There is a little light from the hallway and she has so few books, so she chooses to just drop off the books quickly and leave.
Exactly what he expected she would do. He stands watching as she makes her way to the shelves. Little did she know that he’d been in the book room watching her remove the books before her reading. Had hidden so as to make sure he’d be locked in. He knew she’d return.
The Snake is pleased with himself. Had he not chosen to get rich as a thief, he believes he would have made a fine psychologist. He reads his victims so well. He pictures his yacht docked on the Riviera, waiting for him, the small refrigerator stocked with his favorite champagne. If all goes well, he’ll be on his way home in two days. This boring Florida coast is nothing compared to the beauty of the south of France.
But what’s this? He no longer hears the clicking of her heels. She’s stopped.
“Hello, is someone here?” the woman calls out and he can hear the tremor of fear in her voice. She waits. Of course there is no answer.
The Snake hardly breathes. She must come to the high bookshelf. His plan depends on it.
“Please. I beg you. Is someone here?”
The Snake is poised to go after her should she try to run. But no, she seems to have calmed down. He hears the heels clicking again.
As quickly as she can, she climbs the ladder with her few books in one hand. She thrusts them on the shelf and starts to step down.
Now! The Snake leans from his hiding place behind the bookcase and pushes. He hears the redhead gasp as she feels the bookcase vibrating. She tries to steady it, but she realizes someone is there, pushing it toward her. She tries to hurry back down the ladder. But The Snake gives her no chance as she suddenly feels herself tilting backwards. Both arms go out instinctively to stop the now quickly falling bookcase with all its books tumbling out.
The Snake imagines the look of helpless horror on her face as the bookcase slams his victim to the ground. Her screams die inside her. The job is done.
6
AFTERMATH
“Gladdy, are you sure I should leave?” Evvie hesitates at my door.
“It’s all right. The babysitter may go home now. Thank you for playing ten endless rounds of Spite and Malice to keep me company.”
“Thank you for letting me win. Not because you played the cards badly, but because you weren’t concentrating. As if I didn’t know where your mind was.”
How right she is. All I can think about is why Jack isn’t home yet. How long can a signing take? I gently push her out the door.
“All right. I get the hint. See you in the morning. And don’t worry.”
After Evvie leaves, I curl up on the couch and watch another rerun of Lost. My favorite show. I admit I’m still hooked on the adventures of the once-stranded islanders. But this time it doesn’t distract me. Not even the sexy Sawyer or Sayid hold my attention. I can’t stop myself from looking at my wall clock every few minutes. I give up. I’m going to bed.
I turn all the lights off in the apartment except for a night-light. When Jack finally arrives home all is silent except for the dishwasher in its last rinse cycle. I listen to him tiptoe into the dark bedroom so as not to wake me. But I am up. Believe me, I would have waited all night, if necessary, for his return.
I’m turned on my side, pretending to be asleep. I don’t want to talk to him right now. He probably knows I’m faking it and h
e’s undoubtedly thankful. I hear the rustling of material as he takes off his clothes. Then he is in the bathroom. Naturally, I’m curious about what happened and why he is late. But I’m afraid if I discuss it now, I might handle it badly and maybe say all the wrong things. Better to sleep on it.
Jack climbs into bed behind me and snuggles his naked body close to mine, reaching his arm around my waist. Our favorite sleeping position. Do I smell perfume on him? I’m not sure. I don’t want to know. In moments I hear him snoring lightly.
Now that my ship is back safely in its harbor, I can sleep as well.
But it seems I’ve only just drifted off when the phone rings. We both stir.
“Please, you answer it,” I tell Jack in my barely awake state. One open eye glances at the clock; it’s only five A.M. Then I become more alert. No one phones at this time of night unless it’s bad news. Oh, my God, has something happened to one of our children?
I hear Jack’s voice, full of tension. “When? Where? Yes, of course I’ll come right away.”
He jumps out of the bed and hurries to the closet he shares with me.
It couldn’t be family. All of our clan are up north in New York. It’s someone close by. Oh, no … one of the girls … ?
“What’s wrong?” I’m definitely awake now. “Who’s in trouble … ?”
Jack struggles into his clothes. “It’s Michelle. Her niece Colette has been very badly hurt. She’s unconscious. Michelle is afraid she might die.” As he runs out the door, he calls back to me. “I’ll call as soon as I know more.”
Great. No way I can fall back to sleep now.
Jack stands in the hallway outside Colette’s cubicle in ICU watching Michelle, who is sitting at her niece’s bedside and softly crying. It is very quiet in the hospital. Patients are still asleep. The only person around is a slightly built older man in a white jacket dusting the floorboards along the corridor. Nurses are preparing medication doses. Breakfast will follow soon after. Doctors will make their rounds. After that, there will be a lot of activity. Another nurse comes by with a bouquet of flowers for one of her patients. The old man sneezes. Three times. Jack turns and says, “Gesundheit.”