“Ted didn’t turn on the headlights when we pulled away,” Oliver said. “But we saw the headlights of another vehicle approaching from behind us and figured the cops were making their rounds early.”
“Oh, Ted, what were you thinking,” Stella Logan wailed.
“What were you thinking, Mom?”
“What are you thinking?” Winchester whispered to Reardan.
“That I’ve heard enough for one day.” He stood up and raised his voice. “Ms. Armstrong, would you please step outside with Detective Winchester and me.”
She gathered up her notes, pushed her chair back, and got up. “Excuse me, one and all. Talk among yourselves but please, no name calling or unpleasant accusations.”
Winchester followed Reardan and Quinella into the office with the two-way window. After the door closed, they sat down and rolled their chairs into a circle.
“It could’ve happened the way they claim,” Quinella said with a wave of her fingernails.
Reardan yawned as he stretched his arms into angel wings. “Their timeline doesn’t add up for the routine police check. It’s too early.”
“So maybe someone else did happen along,” Winchester said, “and decided to finish what our soccer boys started.”
“Maybe so, maybe not,” Reardan said. “Either way, however just the punishment they admitted to exacting, it snowballed into Rex Meredith’s death, which means, if nothing else, we could hold them on battery charges.”
“Let’s wait, considering the extenuating circumstances,” Quinella said. “I vote for sending them home, at least for the weekend.”
“Until we have a long talk with the district attorney, yes, it’s not as if any of them are flight risks.” Reardan started counting on his fingers. “Right now we need a day of rest and then another day or so to digest all this disgusting garbage, put everything in perspective.”
Winchester twisted his mouth. “What about Mama Canelli and Matt?”
“Do I detect a trace of doubt, that perhaps my earlier concern has now garnered some merit?”
“I hate it when you’re more right than me.”
“Sorry, I can’t help myself,” Reardan said.
“Something’s not jiving.”
“Can it wait ‘til next week—say, Monday or Tuesday?”
“Are you two going to debate this all night?” Quinella stood up. “I say we send the Mama Bear and her cub home with no further adieu. And just about the time they enter into a state of guarded optimism, we pounce on them again. I do so love a good game of cat and mouse.”
“Amen,” Reardan stood up too. “Go, Quinella, make everybody happy, at least for a little while.”
“Not so fast.” She blocked the door, her Grand Tetons jutting forward. “Aren’t you fellows forgetting something?”
“Oh yeah,” Winchester said. “You did good, Ms. Armstrong. In fact, you outdid yourself.”
CHAPTER 33
What remained of Francesca’s weekend passed in relative tranquility and with no further discussion of the Meredith case which the police had again put on hold. Or so they had explained to her and Matt. Somehow Matt managed to avoid her until the next morning. During breakfast he dawdled over his food, hardly ate the sausage or the sunny-side-up eggs she’d taken such pains to fix.
“You’re not feeling well?” Francesca asked, pressing the back of her hand to his forehead.
Matt jerked away from the gesture that used to bring him comfort, before he turned way too cool. Was that last year or the year before? No, eons ago, after his age had shifted from the innocence of single digits into the temptations of double.
“Come on, Mom,” he mumbled. “Give me a break, okay? I’m just not hungry.”
“Then level with me.” She took advantage of the moment and sat across the table from him. “After all we’ve been through, you owe me that much.”
“You’re right.” He let the fork slip from his fingers, leaned back, and stared at his plate, those once proud yolks now losing their luster. “About the night Coach died, I know what happened … I mean in the parking lot.”
“Really.” She forced a swallow to relieve the lump forming in her throat. “Suppose you tell me.”
He followed up with a what-do-you-take- me-for expression. “Come on, Mom. I know you were there, with Coach in his Navigator. You hopped out and took off in Sybil, leaving him out in the cold, naked as a peeled banana and shaking his fist.”
Her immediate impulse was to crawl under the table. Better yet, into a hole and never resurface, to die with her shame. Never had she felt so naked, peeled and stripped of her last shred of respectability. She couldn’t look at him but managed to ask, “Who told you?”
“Never mind who told me … what the hell, my friends … you know, from soccer. They painted quite a picture.”
“It was ugly, I was stupid, and I’ve already begged your forgiveness. What more can I say? Mia culpa, mia culpa, mia culpa. How many times do you want to hear my Confiteor?”
“Not now, not ever. As far as I’m concerned it’s over, done, fini.” He got up and brushed his lips against her cheek. “Gotta run, love you.”
Before she could tell him the same, Matt was out the door. And she had to live with his latest revelation, the matter-of-fact acknowledgment that although the sins of his mother had first been exposed to his peers and later to him, Matt still forgave the slut, still loved the slut, which meant she couldn’t let her shame interfere with getting Ria off to school or Perri off to another day of condo shopping with Vince. Or, so they said. Francesca was beginning to think otherwise. No self-respecting man could tolerate Perri’s never-ending marathon of condominiums. Unless, failure was his ultimate goal, God bless Vince. Maybe he could convince Perri to marry him after all. They did make a handsome couple and whether Perri was finally secured under her own roof or someone else’s, she wouldn’t have time to worry about what went on under Francesca’s. As for this morning, nothing crucial was in the forecast, just memories she wanted to hold and those she wanted to erase. ‘I got the picture,’ Matt had told her. But evidently, not the whole picture, or they’d still be talking. Mia culpa, mia culpa, mia culpa.
*****
Hours later Fred Montgomery stopped by the house, a surprise since he hadn’t called in advance. “Matt should be home shortly,” Francesca told him as they stood in the foyer. “Would you like something to drink while you wait?”
After declining, he changed his mind and followed her into the kitchen. “A cold beer, if you have any,” he said.
“You’re in luck.” She held up a longneck. My last one, Vince must’ve drunk the others.”
“In that case I insist we share it, Francesca.” He smiled and loosened his tie, allowing his chunky neck a comfortable inch to expand.
Since Fred didn’t impress her as a from-the-bottle kind of person, she divided the beer between two pilsner glasses and led him into the living room, its formal setting more appropriate to business than pleasure. No more newspapers, no more clutter, no more crumbs or apple cores, not with Perri’s expectations for orderliness. If those detectives could’ve seen the place now—no, no, no. not them again, whatever was she thinking—never mind.
Distracted by the momentary lapse, she sat at one end of the sofa, expecting Fred to occupy the occasional chair. Instead, he eased his girth onto the sofa’s middle cushion, an invasion of her space she’d neither expected nor welcomed. The beer grew warm in her hand while she listened to him comment on the room’s charming décor, as if its owner had been blessed with special abilities to transform Shabby Chic into House Beautiful. When the commentary ran dry, she glanced in Fred’s direction, caught him staring at her. Whatever he was thinking would not happen any time soon. She’d learned her lesson the hard way and the worse had yet to come.
“So, where to begin,” he said. “I refer to the case, of course.”
“We should wait for Matt.”
“I’m already here,” Matt said.
“As I was saying, Francesca, according to my sources, the investigators should be wrapping up the Meredith case sometime next week.”
She folded her arms, a barrier to ward off any further advances, no matter how well intended. “Nice and tidy, I hope.”
“Not exactly, but close enough for a game of horseshoes.”
“Huh?” Matt said. “I don’t get it.”
“Sorry, wrong generation for the analogy. Although I don’t have all the details, here’s what I do know. The night Mr. Meredith died started with an unfortunate altercation between him and uh…” He paused to check his notes.
“Ted, Zach, and Oliver,” Matt said. “I already heard.”
“Kids, what can I say?” Fred shrugged, made a face that did nothing to improve the curse of family genes gone wrong. “Anyhow, what began as an exchange of verbal insults evolved rather quickly into that of a physical nature, which ultimately got out of hand and, in all likelihood, resulted in the unfortunate demise of Rex Meredith. Numerous accusations were leveled against the deceased—worse than the coercion and adultery we’ve already discussed. What I mean is sexual abuse, with more than one boy and over a period of years.”
What little beer she’d consumed gurgled up through Francesca’s esophagus, burned her throat as she spoke. “Dear God and all that’s holy. Matt, did he … I mean Rex—”
“Give me a break, Mom. Do I look like I just fell off a stinking pile of … raw manure.” He stopped short of saying more. “So, Fred, any chance of this making the news, not that I care about reading such garbage.”
“Most likely a cleaned-up version, to protect the juveniles involved.”
“And their families,” Francesca felt compelled to add. “Rex’s too.”
Fred burped out more of the lurid details with Francesca interjecting the occasional comments of a concerned parent but her heart was with Matt. He’d slipped into his own world, his blank face revealing little more than a big fat zero. Welcome to Phase Two or Three or Four, Ben would’ve told her. Ben, he wasn’t coming around as much as before. Maybe he was trying to tell her something, that she should go it alone, unless she really felt the need to summon him.
“Fred’s leaving,” she heard Matt say.
She stood up, presented her cheek for him to wet. “About your fee—”
“A done deal, just as Vince already told you.” Then he whispered in her ear. “We should do dinner sometime, just the two of us.”
Fred didn’t wait for an answer she wasn’t prepared to give. A little romance sometime in the foreseeable future—maybe so, maybe not. She still had issues to resolve, the kind that dinner and a movie couldn’t resolve. Later, behind the closed door of her bedroom, she cried into her pillow, for the soccer boys and their families, for Sunny and hers. For Rex, all tears postponed until a date yet to be determined. As for Francesca, she’d let her family down—Ben, Ria, and especially Matt. But he’d get over it. He told her he would, which was all the really mattered. Well, not quite.
CHAPTER 34
The first day of April started out as a dud, another reminder that Francesca’s new life still fell short on humor. Matt, she could understand but Ria, come on. Ria always came to the table prepared, with at least one clever trick for … Ben. Never mind, Francesca needed to move forward. She set her face to happy mode when she released Matt and later Ria into the bright sun of morning. Thirty minutes later the fashion-conscience Perri clumped into the kitchen, a vision of spring in her yellow knitwear.
“Aren’t you the elegant lady,” Francesca said. “Going somewhere special?”
“Shopping, then lunch,” Perri replied while pouring her coffee. “Vince has discovered a darling bistro in West County, authentic French I think. Can I fix you something for breakfast … crepes with cream cheese and strawberry compote?”
“Thanks but I’ll pass.”
“Since when do you pass up my crepes?” She put the back of her hand to Francesca’s forehead just at Francesca had done with Matt a few days before. “Are you feeling all right? You look rather peaked.”
“I’m just not hungry, okay?” How creepy was that. Not only had Francesca turned into her mother but also her son.
Perri backed off, held up her palms. “Don’t be so touchy, Missy. Keeping you healthy is one of my top priorities and should be yours too. Think Matt and Ria.”
“Please, not the orphan angle again.”
Either Perri didn’t hear the remark or she chose not to respond. Too busy laying out her eggs and butter and imported cheese. The woman never gained an ounce, in spite of loving food almost as much as she loved herself. Later, after devouring a continental spread fit for Bon Appétit, she uttered her next words with an unmistakable lilt in her voice. “Would you believe, Vince has asked me to marry him.”
“To which you replied …”
“That I’d have to think long and hard, I’m not getting any younger you know. And since you want me out of here by … dear me, today is April 1 … but don’t worry about me pulling your leg. About the proposal, I mean. I certainly don’t want to burden you or the children.”
“We agreed to your leaving the end of this month.” Francesca felt herself backpedaling, surely not from guilt. Guilt was as subjective as how many layers to peel away from an onion. “It’s not as if you’ve seen every condo on the market.”
“Only those I’d consider making my home. None of which turned out to be acceptable, I might add. Of course, Vince’s house needs considerable work—more to the point, a total refurbishing—but I could turn it into a real showplace. Travertine tile would do wonders in the master bath, as would a deep, luxurious tub, big enough for two.” Perri actually winked.
“Please, that’s more than I want to know.”
“After your fall from grace, please. I still shudder over the obscene picture framed in my mind for all eternity. As for Vince, he promised to give up his stable. In fact, he already released those silly bitches or mares, whatever they’re called these days.”
“And you believe him.”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way, Francesca. Without trust, what good is love?”
“Just don’t coming crying to me when you don’t get your way.”
“Vince won’t disappoint me. I truly believe Fate has brought us together. Why if you hadn’t gotten yourself in such a mess, I’d still be playing shuffleboard with golden age pensioners. Now if you’ll excuse me, I must freshen up before the potential fiancé arrives.” She held out her left hand. “Platinum works for me, a narrow band of diamonds all the way around, nothing flashy, understand, but comparable to a fine heirloom.”
*****
Ten o’clock, half the morning gone and Francesca finally alone, with the house in order, her face made up in the JaMe style, and a bright pink top to herald in the new season. Spring and rebirth, she should’ve felt energized but her queasy stomach wasn’t cooperating, even though she tried ignoring the volcanic rumblings. She wandered into the family room, settled into the comfort of her recliner, which Perri seldom found time to use anymore. Perri and Vince, what a blessing, Francesca could hardly contain herself when Perri announced the good news. She’d never catch a better man than Vince Valente. Besides, the kids needed a grandpa to replace the great Al Canelli who’d played his role to the hilt. Too bad they couldn’t remember Grandma Canelli, a lovely woman who never criticized Francesca. As for the other grandpa, the nameless dirty rotten cheat. L
ou Rivola, there she said it. Lou Rivola, Lou Rivola, Lou Rivola. Matt and Ria had never experienced the pleasure of knowing him, thanks to Perri. Rest in peace, Daddy. Someday I’ll look up your love child, the half brother I never had the chance to meet.
TV offered a relaxing possibility but with the clicker ten feet away, Francesca didn’t feel up to making the effort. The luxury of a morning nap made perfect sense and she was preparing to indulge herself when the doorbell rang. It better not be the detectives again, although she had to admit Guy Winchester did possess a certain charisma she found appealing but much too complicated given the circumstances. One more man in her life she didn’t need, not even a lawyer with money sprouting from his ears. But maybe she did. Fred Montgomery had assured her the Meredith case was history. After wetting her cheek, he’d hugged her too, tighter than necessary, and patted her back as if she needed to burp. About the dinner invitation, she’d take a wait and see approach. Dining in an up-scale restaurant, with no regard for the menu prices, hm-m, how much time had passed since that date night ritual she often took for granted: longer than her entire marriage. Ben, home and children had always taken precedent.
Again, the doorbell rang; its intrusion more unwelcomed than the sour taste emitting from her stomach. She forced herself to get up and when she finally opened the door it was to Sunny, without the sunny disposition.
“Well, it’s about time. I haven’t got all day.” Sunny stepped across the threshold, pushing her aside as she entered the foyer. She moved her skinny jean-clad legs toward the kitchen, with Francesca trailing behind like a wary guest in her own home.
“Could you put on a fresh pot?” Sunny said from over her shoulder. “Starbuck’s is out of the question. I can’t possibly go there or anywhere else in my present state.”
“Uh, sure, it won’t take but a minute.” Had they made a coffee date, Francesca didn’t think so but lately the fuzzy memory had played tricks on her brain.
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