Why would she go out looking for trouble?
Chapter 28
The door to the salon opened at about one o’clock, and Jenny danced in carrying a whole chocolate cake on a glass stand.
“Anybody feel like dessert?”
Greer laughed, and Celia eyed the sweet suspiciously. “I do?” she said hesitantly, as though she weren’t sure whether she did, or if it was okay to want cake.
“C’mon, let’s go to the kitchen and get some plates,” Greer directed.
Humming, Jenny swept them into the back, offering slices to Dario, Jonathan, the other stylists, and anyone else in her wake as she went. The result was a small, informal party near the coffeemaker.
Dario watched Jenny’s body sway with pleasure as she handed out servings. “What’s the occasion?” he asked.
“It’s Tuesday!” Jenny chirruped.
Dario accepted a plate from her and said knowingly, “You got some last night.”
“Wrong,” Jenny sang. “I got some last night and this morning and twice on Sunday!”
Jonathan sighed audibly, “My hero!” he exclaimed.
“And may I ask who’s watching the shop while you’re over here spreading sweetness and light?” asked Greer.
“My love slave.” Jenny laughed delightedly. “We had a really good talk, and he’s agreed to come in and help me out until I can afford an employee. So today that means I get to thank my best customers and make a trip to the bank without closing up shop.”
Greer felt the warm spread of gratitude in her chest. It delighted her to see her new friend happy. She noticed that Dario was watching her with one eyebrow raised.
“What?” Greer asked.
“I believe you may have something to report as well,” he suggested.
A dozen eyes turned to Greer. Dario explained, “She had a date.”
Greer laughed. “I was set up, more like!”
Jonathan and Jenny chorused each other with a single word: “And?”
Looking mischievously from face to face, Greer made them all wait while she took a large, deliberate bite of cake and savored the rich taste. Then she said, “I had a delightful evening.”
“And?” Celia asked.
“And,” Greer told them all firmly, “that’s all I’m saying.”
The bells on the front door jangled, and Dario leaned his head around the corner to see who it was. Sterling had come into the shop.
“Is it a customer?” Greer asked, setting down her plate and wiping her mouth on a napkin.
Dario’s eyes glittered evilly. “Speak of the devil and he will appear.”
“It’s not that big a deal, Dario,” Greer told him. Turning to Jenny, she asked, “Do I have chocolate on my teeth?”
“Clean,” Jenny told the grinning Greer, who straightened her dress, checked her face in a small mirror, and, after composing herself with a deep breath, sauntered casually out onto the salon floor, where she registered surprise as she rounded the corner.
The Cake Eaters United looked at one another and tried not to laugh out loud.
“Hi, may I help you, sir?” Greer asked in her most professional voice as she reached the front, but the blush gave her away.
“Oh, yes. I was interested in getting a treatment.” Sterling put an elbow up on the counter and leaned against it.
“Really, what kind of a treatment?”
“The special treatment comes to mind.” His white teeth flashed, and Greer thought, Wow, he’s handsome.
“Let me check and see if we have that on our menu of services.” Greer picked up a trifolded flyer and pretended to peruse it. “Oh, yes, it seems that we’re running a special on that special treatment. Lucky you.”
Sterling looked into the magnificent green eyes that regarded him playfully, in which he read a great deal of desire for him, and with a purring smile he said,
“Yes. Lucky me.”
Jonathan pulled his head back around the corner and offered his hand, high in the air, to Dario, who slapped it with a sharp smack.
“Score!” Jonathan did a miniature victory dance.
Jenny’s eyes narrowed. “You did not set them up.”
“Oh, yes,” said Dario, “we did.”
Celia’s gaze went reverently from Dario to Jonathan. She sidestepped to the hallway and peeked out at the couple at the front, who were flirting unabashedly. Turning back to the small group in the kitchen, she looked worshipfully up at Dario.
In a breathless, eager voice, she said, “Do me next.”
Jenny threw her head back and laughed. “Girl, have another piece of cake.”
Chapter 29
Jenny spotted Leah when she came into the bank and waved. Leah was so jittery she could only smile back tightly, and was relieved when Jenny went to get in the teller’s line. She watched as Vince came out from his office and spoke to Josie. He glanced up and caught her watching him. His eyes glinted meanly at her before she could look away. He knew he had her, that she was afraid. Damn him!
The door opened again, and a young woman came in wearing dark glasses. She stopped and looked hesitantly around. All the tellers were busy, but no one was seated at Leah’s desk. The woman in glasses came over.
“Hi. Is Vince in?” she asked Leah.
Leah perked up. Who was this? She glanced over at Vince’s office; he’d gone in and shut the door. As Leah was wondering why the young woman didn’t take the glasses off on an overcast day, she spotted bruises on the girl’s wrist that she quickly tried to conceal by pulling down her sweater cuffs.
“Can I tell him who’s asking for him?”
“Terry.”
“And what is this regarding?”
The girl blanched visibly and reached up to readjust her glasses. She turned sideways as she did so, and Leah saw the discoloring of a black eye. “It’s, um . . . well, he’ll know. It’s personal.”
Leah’s heart twisted like a wet rag in a wringer. No, not again. She couldn’t stand by and see the Rattler victimize someone else.
She didn’t know exactly what to say, but she felt she had to make some connection, so, keeping her best business voice, she said, “If it’s personal business with you two, I may be able to help you.” She waited while the girl took that in.
“What?” she asked, obviously confused.
“I’m his ex-wife, and I’m very familiar with how Vince deals with women on a personal level.”
The girl started back as though Leah had slapped her.
“Listen,” Leah said hurriedly in a low voice, “if he did that to you, you need to talk to somebody. You might think it’s none of my business, but, girl, that man is big trouble, and you can still walk away.”
Over the girl’s shoulder she saw Vince come out of his office again, spot Terry at her desk, and head purposefully to the buzzer door.
“Take one of my cards,” Leah urged, picking one up and shoving it into the stunned girl’s hand. “Call me.”
Vince closed in on the pair, and without so much as a greeting he turned to Terry. “What are you doing here?” he said, a public smile on his face, but a very private anger in his tone.
Leah cut in. “She was just inquiring whether you were here. I told her you were busy, but that I would see if you had time to meet with her. That’s as far as we got. Is there a problem?” Her heart was pounding. Would the girl be smart enough to pick up on this and keep her mouth shut?
Terry turned to Vince, and Leah watched as she slipped the business card deftly into her pocket, out of Vince’s line of sight.
“Hi, I was in the neighborhood and I thought you might want to get a cup of coffee or something.”
Vince took her arm, and Leah watched as the girl flinched. She could remember all too well that grip on already bruised skin.
“And why,” asked Vince, turning his considerable contempt onto Leah, “is she asking you?”
Another memory cut into Leah’s vision like a flash card: being tied to the bed by Vince, the cut
ting pain in her wrists, hiding the abrasions with long cuffs. She managed to shrug. “I was the only one who didn’t have a customer, I suppose. Why shouldn’t she ask me?”
He smiled slowly. It was a warning smile with all the warmth of an approaching tsunami, but before he could speak they were interrupted by Jenny. Her transaction finished, she had appeared beside Leah’s desk.
“Hi, I just wanted to stop by and . . .” Jenny’s friendly greeting died on her lips. It was apparent to the meanest intellect that there was a confrontation going on, and she instantly recognized Vince as the antagonistic Ducati rider the night outside the bar and realized why he’d seemed vaguely familiar then. She hadn’t recognized him out of the bank and his fancy suit. But the look on his face now was the same as it had been then: angry and challenging. “Oh, sorry,” she muttered.
Leah didn’t look at her, but she was intensely grateful for the break as she said, “Don’t be; we’re almost done.” She prayed that it was true, because she didn’t think she could maintain the casual pretense for more than another ten seconds.
“No, no.” Vince put on his charming-bank-manager face, but he couldn’t stop his eyes from sliding licentiously up and down Jenny’s body. “You two go right ahead. I’m going to walk Ms. Richards to her car. Have a great afternoon.” He gave Jenny a friendly wink and, still holding Terry firmly by the arm, walked her to the door.
Leah sank into her chair and found that no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get enough oxygen into her lungs. She started to draw rapid, shallow breaths.
Jenny leaned over her. “Are you okay? Come on, come on, you’re hyperventilating. Let’s go to the ladies’ room.”
Leah nodded, snatched up her key to the employees’ restroom, and half led, half followed Jenny to the narrow hallway. Once inside, Jenny grabbed at a section of paper towel and instructed Leah to hold it over her mouth and breathe through it. “Same principle as a paper bag,” she reasoned. She placed her open palm on Leah’s back between her shoulder blades and rubbed softly in a circle, the way a mother would to calm a sobbing child.
Within thirty seconds, the carbon dioxide and the comforting contact had done their work, and Leah’s breathing had slowed to almost normal.
“Better?” Jenny asked her with concern in her pretty brown eyes. Leah nodded. “You want to tell me what that was all about?”
“That,” said Leah, sucking in a big breath, “was my ex.”
“Oh. And how about the girl?”
“Don’t know her, but I think . . .” Leah stopped; she’d been on the verge of revealing that she’d been abused by saying that she suspected he was doing it again. “I think that he might have hit her. She had a black eye, and he’s got a nasty temper. He drinks a lot. I left him when he started drinking. His personality changed.” She hoped, lamely, that it sounded like she’d left before he’d turned violent.
“I see.” Jenny waited for a moment, still rubbing Leah’s back in the rhythmic circular motion. When she spoke again it was with a quiet sense of impartiality.
“It’s frustrating, but there isn’t much you can do. Some women are ashamed that other people would find out about it, so they deny it.” Leah had a knee-jerk response and shifted uncomfortably, as though her whole body had jumped suddenly a couple of inches to the right. Jenny did not comment on the reaction. “Or, for some fucked-up reason, they think they deserve to be treated badly.” She fell quiet but kept the massaging contact. Leah was enchanted by the lull and the strength of this woman. It felt good just to sit with her and suck up her potency by osmosis; she felt safe for the first time in months.
Then Jenny began to speak again. Her voice was without extreme emotion, which, oddly, gave the story an even greater sense of being deeply intense and personal.
“And then some have nowhere else to go. I remember, from as early as I can remember, my father hitting my mother. He drank too, but he’d hit her even when he was sober. If she said something he didn’t like, any excuse would do. He was a miserable bastard with a shitty life, and he took it out on her.
“He hit me a few times, but mostly he went after my older brother or my mom. I realize now that she would get in between us to keep him away from us.”
“How awful,” Leah said.
“Suffice to say I didn’t exactly have a Brady Bunch childhood, and I don’t want to drag you through my depressing memories, but there is one particular time that I want to tell you about.”
Jenny sighed and leaned against the sink, staring straight ahead at the tile wall in front of her. “My dad had a friend who was always trying to feel me up and corner me when he and my dad had polished off a bottle of tequila. Well, one night, after my mom had died, my dad drank so much he passed out on the sidewalk outside our apartment building, and this guy, he came after me when I was asleep, thinking I’d be easy prey. I woke up and heard him taking his pants off. He was panting like a freight train, not real subtle.”
Leah’s breathing had gone from hyperventilation to almost nothing. She was fixated on the words that echoed softly through the bathroom from Jenny’s past.
“It was a tiny room. I tried to get up and run around him, but he pinned me down on my bed.” She paused as a shudder of revulsion crossed her face. “I can’t tell this story without thinking I smell tequila and body odor. Anyway, I was terrified, of course, but something else. I remembered my mom and all the years that she suffered because of my father, and a kind of rage came up and gave me a strength that shocked the shit out of me—and him too, I can tell you. I only knew one thing.” Jenny turned and looked at Leah, her eyes bright and fierce. “I would not be a victim. I would not make that choice, whatever else happened. I was going to fight.”
Almost daring to speak, Leah asked softly, “What did you do?”
Jenny looked away again, as though that would make it easier to say. “I grabbed his dick in one hand and his balls in the other, and I twisted as hard as I could in opposite directions.” Leah was too shocked to say anything, and Jenny went on. “He beat the shit out of my face, trying to get me to let go, but I wouldn’t. He broke my nose, but I hung on. I don’t know how; I was so angry that I didn’t even feel it until afterward. I kept twisting until he was begging me stop. But I wouldn’t; I made him stand up, walk out onto the street, and call for the police.”
“Did they come?”
For the first time, Jenny smiled. “Them and the rest of the neighborhood. It was quite a visual, I’m sure: this fat, ugly, middle-aged fucker with an underage girl in a white nightgown trying to twist his dick off.”
There was absolute silence, and then—she couldn’t help it—Leah snorted with laughter. Both her hands flew up to clap tightly over her mouth, and she turned horrified eyes to Jenny. “I’m sorry. It’s not funny. I didn’t mean to laugh,” she apologized.
But from Jenny’s compressed lips a hooting laughter escaped, and like jumping from a plane at twenty thousand feet, they both launched into the free fall of helpless release, laughing until tears streamed down their faces and they snatched at paper towels to blot them away. Eventually the hysteria subsided and the parachutes came out; they drifted gently back to earth and a thoughtful calm came over them again, punctuated by an occasional gusty giggle while they both leaned against the sink with their shoulders touching lightly.
“The point is, I think,” Jenny said, “that you have to choose to not be a victim. And that woman out there today—and every woman—has to make that choice for themselves. Sometimes that choice means asking for help.” She glanced at Leah, then said wryly, “And sometimes it means trying to separate a man from his dearest possession.”
The two women smiled at each other, having said everything they needed to say.
Chapter 30
“There’s a Whitney Whitehorse on line one for you? Do you want me to take a message?” Celia had knocked tentatively on the door of Greer’s room while she was changing the covering of her treatment table.
“Oh,
okay, I’ll take it. Thank you, Celia.” The thin face slipped back out of the narrow opening, and as Greer turned her attention to the blinking light on the phone, a vague foreboding rose inside her like a tide turning.
“Hi, Whitney, is everything all right?”
“Probably. But the school called, and apparently Joy didn’t show up today. I was wondering if Joshua was there and if he’d seen her, or if you guys had heard anything.” Whitney tried to keep her voice light, but strands of worry were woven into it like an overly loud plaid.
The waves of premonition lapped higher in Greer’s chest, salty and icy cold. “No, I haven’t heard anything. Joshua went this morning on his bike. He doesn’t have his cell phone on at school, so I can’t call him, but I’ll leave a message at home for him to call you as soon as he gets there. Okay?”
“Okay, I’m sure she’s fine. It’s not the first time she’s cut classes to go hang out and smoke with those loser friends of hers.” There was a pause, and then Whitney asked hesitantly, “What do you think?”
Greer didn’t want to answer—or rather, she did, but she wanted to be reassuring, confidently cheerful. Instead she told Whitney the truth. “I don’t know what to think yet. But I have a question. Was Joy wearing the bracelet I gave her when she left today?” Greer held her breath waiting for the answer. Please say yes, she was praying.
“I think so. I didn’t really notice, but I don’t think she’s taken it off since you gave it to her.” She waited for a response, but Greer was breathing her thanks, so she asked, “Why? Is it important?”
“Maybe,” Greer told her. “It will help me find her energy and sense what’s going on with her.”
Whitney perked up, eager for an ounce of control in the situation. “Can you locate her from that?”
Greer felt sad. “No. I don’t have that kind of ability. Only a sense of what forces are around a person, mostly future influences. But maybe it will help. Let me call you back in a little while. Call me if you hear anything?”
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