Pink Neon Dreams

by Pink Neon Dreams [Evernight] (mobi)

  “No problem. Are you okay now?”

  He made a face and nodded. “Yeah, I’m great. Not really but I’ll do.”

  Cecily rose from the floor to sit beside him on the couch. She rested one hand on his right knee. “Want to talk about it? Sometimes it helps.”

  Daniel jerked. “No,” he said. Then he sighed. “But, yeah, I do, I think. I should and maybe I will but later. Maybe I’ll talk about it after we eat if you’ve got any booze in the house.”

  “I might be able to find some,” she said with a smile she didn’t feel. “Supper’s about ready, though, if you’re hungry.”

  “I am,” Daniel said. “Let me wash up, first.”

  She admired his apparent determination to carry on as if nothing happened. While he headed for the bathroom, Cecily set the table. She put their salad bowls at each place and then brought the salmon and potatoes out of the oven. Then, after a moment’s consideration, she put the disposable salt and pepper shakers she’d bought between them and added the container of Cajun seasoning.

  “Whatever the hell you’re serving, it smells good,” Daniel said. Having failed to hear him come into the kitchen, Cecily jumped.

  “It’s lemon pepper salmon filets and some oven potatoes,” she said. “Plus, there’s a salad to start. I hope you like balsamic vinaigrette dressing - it’s all I’ve got.”

  “Sure,” he said as he sat down at the table.

  Resisting an urge to grasp his hands and ask a blessing, an old habit from childhood she hadn’t followed in years, Cecily dripped a little salad dressing over her greens. Then she took a bite and watched Daniel do the same. “It’s nothing fancy,” she said. “It’s salad out of a bag from the supermarket.”

  “It’s fine.”

  “I think the salmon will taste better.” Their conversation seemed awkward after the intimate moment or it seemed so to Cecily. Uncertain how much more she could say about the simple meal, she finished her salad without speaking. Head down, Daniel did the same. Judging by the way he cleaned the bowl, he must either be hungry or as ill at ease as she was.

  About the time she’d decided to scrape her dinner into the trash, she glanced up to see him grinning. “What?” she demanded.

  “Food’s delicious,” Daniel said. “I don’t get much chance to sit down and eat anything home cooked so it’s a treat.”

  The sincerity in his voice reached through her prickly mood and Cecily forced herself to admit the uneasiness belonged to her, not Daniel. “Thank you,” she said. “I appreciate the compliment. I didn’t have much chance to cook for years, but I like it. I used to be a pretty fair cook back when I was a teenager.”

  After he swallowed, Daniel nodded. “I’d say you still are.”

  Her natural sass surged back. “Yeah? So what do you eat? Let me guess—bologna and salami sandwiches, frozen burritos, pizza and fast food or what?”

  Eyes shut in apparent food ecstasy, Daniel sighed and grinned. “Guilty of all of the above at times, but I’m not always that lame.”

  “No?”

  He shook his head. “Once in a while I do make a huge pot of chili and then freeze it so I can warm it up when I come home from a long day. I can manage to fry a hamburger once in a while or nuke a couple of hot dogs in the microwave. And you forgot to include canned soup and ravioli.”

  “Poor baby.” Cecily meant to sound mocking, but the words came out softer than she intended, probably because she felt sorry he endured such a crappy diet. “Don’t you ever get invited home for Sunday dinner or over to someone’s house?”

  “My mama lives in El Paso now,” he said. “It’s a long damn way to go home very often.”

  Desire to know more about him overruled her manners. “I bet she can cook.”

  “Oh, yeah, she can. Her Tex-Mex stuff is better than any restaurant I’ve ever tried. Burritos, enchiladas, quesadillas, even tamales.”

  “I think I’m jealous,” Cecily said. “My mom could make the best damn fried chicken you ever put in your mouth, biscuits and gravy too. She made ham and beans with cornbread so good it’d revive the dead.”

  Once she realized what she’d shared, her mind froze. Her mother wasn’t someone she talked about, ever, to anyone but Nia. Remembering hurt too much, and she’d schooled herself not to even think about Mom.

  “Sounds pretty damn good to me,” Daniel replied. “Does she have you over to eat very often?”

  The last bite of salmon caught halfway down her throat and she choked, a little. Cecily drank some ice water to wash it down and blinked back a stray tear. “Not anymore,” she said. “She died two years after I got married.”

  His expression altered. “I’m sorry, Cecily.”

  “Yeah,” she said. The words cut her throat like broken glass on the way out of her mouth. “I am, too.”

  The old grief threatened to kick up again and her emotions must’ve been plain to read because Daniel reached out across the table and grasped her hand. His fingers curled around hers, warm and solid. “Hey,” he said. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  “It’s okay,” she said and meant it. “I know you didn’t. I have a hard time talking about it, that’s all.”

  Most guys would press for details and ask questions she’d rather not answer, but Daniel didn’t. “I understand,” he said, voice serious and low. “If you ever want to, though, I’ll listen.”

  He sounds like he means it, but how can he? He’s here on vacation and he’ll be gone in a few days or weeks. I just got settled and I can’t traipse off to Kansas City.

  “Thanks,” Cecily said. “Maybe I will, sometime.”

  Strange but she felt like she could spill it all out to Daniel. He wouldn’t condemn her or blame her when he heard the sad story. Willard, damn his soul to the pit, never wanted her to mention it, afraid some of his society friends might make the connection between his young trophy bride and the laundry worker mugged, then stabbed to death behind a Southside bar, The Half and Half. Although he paid for a simple funeral and burial, he kept it quiet as if ashamed of his mother-in-law, her humble life, and her horrible death. Cecily shut the memories out before they swamped her and focused on Daniel as he finished the meal.

  “I think there’s a few potatoes left if you want them,” she said.

  Daniel put down his fork with a flourish. “No thanks, I’m full,” he said. “It was a good meal.”

  ****

  A glass of sweet red wine mellowed Daniel’s mood. He sat slumped in a plastic lawn chair, feet propped on an old milk crate in Cecily’s back yard, totally at ease. As he sipped from the blue plastic goblet, he glanced over at Cecily, seated at his side. Although the tiny backyard offered nothing besides overgrown grass, a few straggly weeds, and a sagging clothesline, he liked the place and the company. She grew on him and he couldn’t help but tag his growing emotions to her as some kind of addiction. His reaction to her offered comfort startled him and yet he savored it too. Their relationship—a word he didn’t even want to believe he used - wasn’t just the sex, although it’d been mind blowing so far. They connected on another level too, down where whatever might be left of his soul lived deep within.

  They hadn’t spoken in several minutes when Cecily broke the silence. “So, did you want to talk about your bad dream?”

  Damn. He’d said he might and he probably should, although it was the last thing he wanted. Sharing would destroy his peace, but if he didn’t, Daniel figured the dream would return. Then he’d have more explaining to do. “I suppose I should,” he said.

  Cecily stretched out her hand to stroke his. “You don’t have to if it hurts,” she said.

  “It does, but that’s why I do,” Daniel said and hoped his words made sense.

  She nodded. “Okay, so tell me what the dream was about.”

  He drew a long, deep breath and exhaled. Then he plunged into it before he lost his nerve. “It’s as much memory as nightmare,” he said. “Sometimes I dream about my daughter and the d
ay she died.”

  Her hand held his and squeezed tight. “I didn’t know you had a daughter.”

  Of course she didn’t. I’ve known her for what, two days if you count today. I know more about her because I’ve read her file. I’m supposed to be investigating her, but there’s no way she’d know. “Her name was Mollie,” he said, each word stabbing into his heart like a knife wound. “She’d just turned four when she died.”

  “Oh, sugar.” Her voice resonated with soft compassion. “That must’ve been very hard for you and your wife.”

  “No wife,” Daniel said. “I never married her mother, Lisa. But there wasn’t any doubt Mollie was mine, so I paid child support and got visitation. I saw her the night she died, a few hours before.”

  “What happened?”

  “House fire,” he said. “Accidental or so the report said, after. They couldn’t determine how it started, but it was probably bad wiring. The house was a wreck. Thing is, Mollie should’ve been with me, but her mother wouldn’t let her go. So I’ve always felt it was my fault.”

  “It’s not,” Cecily said. “You shouldn’t beat yourself up like that. I’m sorry you lost your little girl, but you can’t blame yourself, Daniel.”

  A bitter laugh thrust up from his belly. “I have for the last nine years, chica, and probably always will.”

  “You have to let go or it’ll eat you alive,” Cecily said. The way she spoke, it confirmed what he’d already figured out—she knew pain, too.

  “Easier to say than to do,” he replied. “Is there more wine?”

  “Sure,” she said as she lifted the bottle to fill his glass again. “And another bottle if we want it. Drinking may dull the pain, but it won’t take it away. If you want to banish those old heartaches, you need to talk about them. Then they don’t have so much power.”

  “I can’t.” As soon as the words were out, however, Daniel knew he would. He spilled everything, all about Lisa and how he met her. He sketched a realistic portrait and left out nothing, not her naïve innocence or how he seduced her to prove he could. Although he cringed to tell it, Daniel told about Lisa’s fundamentalist religion and how it grew to take over her life like choking kudzu. And he talked about Mollie, not just her death but for the first time, he shared memories of his kid. “She loved those damn Disney channel shows, the ones about teenagers most of all,” he said as his voice broke. “Poor kid never made it to be one, but she loved that shit. She adored animals, so we went to the zoo a lot. I think she would’ve eaten pizza for every meal. Lisa didn’t want to let her watch Disney or eat pizza, too much of the wicked world, so Mollie did both at my place. And she had a laugh, Mollie did, like music. God damn, I miss her.”

  Cecily gave him a few minutes of space before she said, “I wish I could’ve known her, sugar. I love kids.”

  To shut off the pain radiating through his body, Daniel asked, “You got any?”

  He knew she didn’t, though, but he wondered why so he asked.

  “Nope,” she said. “I would’ve loved some but ‘the mister’ couldn’t father any. He’d been fixed, something he never mentioned until we’d been married three years. It’s a good thing, though, it would’ve made things a lot more complicated to get out of his house and away.”

  She’d make a good mother, he thought, with her caring, her compassion, and her urge to nurture. “You’d be a great parent,” he said. “You’re young enough you might still get the chance to have some children one day.”

  Those dark eyes widened for a moment and then she said, “True. And you might have another kid or two, too. You’re not quite an old man just yet, sugar.”

  Her words hit him harder than a punch to the solar plexus. Daniel never considered another child. Mollie, as beautiful and loved as she was, had been an accident. He hadn’t allowed himself to get close enough to a woman to consider a child, and he’d made damn sure he used protection. His long range plans involved nothing but working for the bureau and growing old, alone. But Cecily made him think; she evoked a want he hadn’t even been aware he possessed. And for a few moments, he couldn’t speak for the intense emotional pain.

  “Anything’s possible, I guess,” he said.

  Cecily smiled with a beautiful expression powerful enough to light up the darkness. “Oh, yeah,” she said. “Now you’re getting somewhere. Listen, I thought my life dead-ended years ago and then one day, something happened that made me see things in a different way. I changed my course and here I am, in a new town, with the boutique of my dreams and with you.”

  Daniel admired her wisdom, her spunk, and her spirit. He ached to find a new path for his lonely life and out of curiosity, with need, he asked, “Why did you leave after what was it, ten years?”

  Proud and unashamed, her gaze met his. “Will was unfaithful ever since I married him,” she said after a pause. “And once he had me, he just wanted to keep me to show off like a doll on a shelf. When we had sex, it was like a ritual, a habit, just something you do because you’re supposed to do it. Then I found out he dressed up like a 1940’s movie star, wig, heels, and all to go pick up other transvestites. On top of all the rest and his drug abuse, it was just too damn much for me. He treated me like shit anyway, and I decided I wasn’t going to put up with it anymore. I told him I was getting a divorce.”

  If the bastard wasn’t already dead, I’d want to kill him for treating her like shit. “Didn’t he realize what he had?”

  Her olive complexion blushed. “You mean me? No, I don’t suppose he did. He liked showing me off like a prize pony or something, but he kept me at arm’s length.”

  “Mistake,” Daniel commented.

  Cecily met his gaze and took his breath away. Those aren’t the eyes of a killer or the eyes of someone who hired one. She’s innocent. I know it in my bones.

  “I’d call it that if you’re talking about Will,” she said. “But what about you and me? Do you think we’re making a mistake?”

  “No,” he said and meant it. “I don’t. It’s fast and it’s wild, but it’s not an error.”

  And Daniel realized as soon as the words left his lips, he’d have to tell her the truth. If he told her now he was an FBI agent sent to investigate her, they’d still have a chance. If he kept it secret any longer, it would destroy any possibility between them.

  “Good,” Cecily said. “I don’t think it is either.”

  Tell her, you bastard. Just spit it on out and handle her reaction. She’s going to be pissed but better now than after you make love again. He struggled to find a way to say it so it wouldn’t seem so damn bad or make him out a villain. Daniel wanted to make her understand why he’d kept silent about it until now. Somehow he needed to spin it so she wouldn’t hate him.

  Deep in thought, he didn’t speak for a few minutes, longer than he thought because Cecily leaned over and shook his shoulder. He inhaled her sweet, rich perfume and wanted to kiss her first. The wine he’d drunk sent dizzy spirals though his head when he moved.

  “Daniel?” she inquired. “Is something wrong? You zoned out on me.”

  Her concern made it harder, but he looked up. “Cecily, I need to tell you something before we go any farther. I should’ve told you up front, but I didn’t know it’d be like this between us.”

  She frowned and made a furrow between her eyes. “Whatever it is, just tell me. How bad can it be?”

  “Try not to hate me, okay?”

  “You’re starting to scare me, sugar.”

  “All right, I’ll just say it straight out—I’m an FBI agent out of the Kansas City office. They sent me here to check you out.”

  Her amazing eyes turned to onyx. “For what?”

  “Your ex-husband’s murder and the theft of two million dollars in jewels.”

  The words hung between them, almost tangible enough to touch. Daniel watched as the information sank into her consciousness and saw the terrible knowledge change the expression on her face. A minute passed, then two, maybe three. “You thi
nk I did it?” she said.

  “No,” Daniel said. “I know you didn’t.”

  Cecily stood up and stood still. She reminded him of the eerie calm before a tornado slams out of the sky or the pause prior to a thunderstorm unleashing fury from the heavens. An almost pagan fear of the unknown seized his chest and he tensed, his earlier relaxation gone.

  “How?” she asked.

  Aware what he said might well either save his ass or trash it, Daniel came to his feet and faced her. “Everything I’ve come to know about you tells me you didn’t kill him and you wouldn’t. You’re a hell of a lot more straightforward than that, and I know you didn’t take the jewels. And my gut says so, too, for whatever it’s worth.”

  “Uh-huh,” she said with her usual bravado, but he saw the tears glinting in her eyes. “Right. Want to explain why it took so long to mention your career, G-man?”

  He couldn’t. But he tried. “I don’t know. I was afraid you’d be pissed at me.”

  “Yeah, I am,” Cecily cried in a voice sharp with the lilt of the Chicago neighborhood she’d called home. “That’s why you choked, on the fishing pier, isn’t it? You didn’t want to tell me.”

  “That’s true, I didn’t because I already knew how attracted I was to you,” Daniel said. It sounded lame even to him.

  “So how do I know any of this is real?” she asked. A tear slipped from her eye to trail down her cheek. He wanted to wipe it away, but he didn’t dare touch her, not now. “Maybe it’s just all some bullshit FBI tactics to get me to confide in you.”

  Her accusation hit him with force and Daniel knew, reeling, he cared very much for this woman. Hell, maybe he loved her. He’d never been one to believe in ‘love at first sight’ but he couldn’t deny the powerful attraction he’d felt from the second he saw Cecily. Nor could he explain the closeness he felt to her or why he’d confided things he never spoke about.

  “It’s not, querida,” he said. “It’s real, realer than anything I’ve felt in years. I’ve been dead inside, but you revived me. Believe me. I don’t lie.”

  Her eyes narrowed to slits. “Except when you don’t mention who the hell you are and what you’re doing.”