Thrilled To Death

by Jennifer Apodaca

  Bo stuck the pan of bread in the broiler and laughed. “Not yet.”

  Joel took the huge bowl of salad that Bo handed him and set it on the table. “Did you bring your capes with you?”

  “Sorry, dude. I don’t usually cook in my capes.” He winked at me as I sat out bowls and plates. “Cooking is a different kind of magic.”

  TJ finished setting up the six-foot folding table end to end with the picnic table on the patio. He came in the opened sliding glass door and stepped over Ali, who was sleeping. “How come you like cooking?”

  I looked at TJ in surprise. Joel was everyone’s instant friend. And since Bo was a magician, that made them best buddies. But TJ, he was more suspicious and standoffish. They both had met Bo, but it had been a couple years since they had seen him.

  Bo glanced over at him. He seemed to judge TJ for a second, then said, “Life on the road is full of motels and no kitchens. I’m at the mercy of fast food and greasy diners. When I’m not on the road, I enjoy the process of cooking. It sort of makes me feel like home, I guess.”

  I smiled at Bo. He’s been teasing with Joel, but he got that TJ asked a serious question. I think Bo understood TJ was trying to get his measure and figure out if he should trust him.

  TJ looked at me, then flashed a grin. “Mom tries to get out of cooking.”

  I made a face and tossed a tablecloth at him. “Put that on the table, smart guy.”

  TJ caught it and headed toward the slider, then he stopped. “Mom, how come Ali’s sleeping?

  I looked over and frowned. “She’s pouting. Bo doesn’t love her.”

  “Typical female,” Bo said unapologetically. “I’ll probably have to buy her flowers.”

  “Try beer,” Joel suggested.

  Bo set down his glass of iced tea. “No foolin’?”

  “She’s a lush,” Joel said. “But she’s the best dog in the world.”

  Bo shrugged. “Okay, I’ll take your word for it.”

  “Mom, when is Gabe getting here?” Joel asked. “What’s his brother like?”

  “He’s like Gabe, I guess. He’s a fireman.” On a time-out, whatever that meant.

  TJ walked in from the patio. “So if Grandpa and Fletch start something on fire, he can save us?”

  I mock groaned. “Fletch is coming? Where are the fire extinguishers?”

  That finally got Grandpa’s attention. He got up from the computer and said, “Sammy, it’s all an act with Fletch. You should remember that.”

  I instantly felt bad. Grandpa had come face to face with what he believed was his failure in Shane today. I had to lay off teasing Fletch. “I know, Grandpa. I’ve seen his shows. I know how talented Fletch is.”

  “He has big news too!” Joel said, turning back to Bo. “Fletch is performing at the House of Cards. We all have tickets.”

  Bo nodded. “That is very big news.” He went to the oven to get the bread out. “I love the part of his act where he keeps vanishing all his assistants by accident. It cracks me up every time.”

  I went to help Bo put the bread in a towel-covered basket. “He does have the comic flair,” I said.

  Ali barked and got up from her place by the sliding glass window and ran joyfully to the front door.

  “Gabe’s here!” Joel announced, and raced to the door.

  Bo looked at me. “How does he know who is at the door?”

  I wiped my hands on a towel. “Ali. She knows Gabe’s truck, and that’s her Gabe-bark.”

  Bo made an impressed face. “Animals aren’t my thing, but that’s cool.”

  “Finally met a female you didn’t want to charm? Who knew?” I grinned, then added, “I’ll be right back.” I turned and headed to the front door, then laughed at the scene. “Joel, you and Ali need to let Gabe and Cal in.” Ali had jumped up to put her front paws on Gabe’s shoulders to greet him while Gabe held a bakery box out of her reach. In the meantime, Joel was talking a mile a minute to Cal, who had a grocery bag in his hand. They were still on the porch. Cal looked relaxed and appeared to be answering Joel. I hurried over and put my hand on Joel’s shoulder. A small part of my heart worried that Joel had been scarred by his rotten dad and was therefore desperate for male attention. But most of my heart knew that was just Joel. He was outgoing and thought every minute was a new adventure.

  Joel was still talking. “. . . so Ali is special because she was trained as a police dog.”

  Cal turned and looked at Gabe scratching Ali’s ears. “I can see that. She looks like she’s very smart.”

  I used my hand on Joel’s shoulder to guide him back from the door. “Hi Cal, come on in. We’re just about ready to eat. Cal looked freshly showered and had on clean jeans and a button-down shirt. His lip had scabbed again. I hoped he could eat the jambalaya. He stepped in, then leaned down and kissed me on the cheek.

  “Thanks for inviting me. I’m starved.” He held up the bag and added, “I brought wine. I’ll find the kitchen.” He headed off in the right direction.

  I turned back to look at Gabe. Ali had gotten down and trotted over to follow Cal into the kitchen. Gabe came in and closed the door. He had on a green shirt and black jeans. “Are you hungry?” I asked him.

  He did his wicked grin. “Oh yeah.”

  My stomach somersaulted. It was official, I was a hussy. “Good. Bo cooked a lot of jambalaya.”

  He laughed, then reached out to wrap an arm around my waist and pull me to him. To his mouth. Then he looked at me. “That’ll hold me until later.”

  “Right. Later.” God he was hot.

  “I started some searches and should have the information by tonight. After everyone leaves, I’ll get my laptop and we’ll see what we got. Cal drove his truck so he can get home on his own.”

  I nodded. Work. Could we work in my room naked? I glanced at my sons chatting with Cal as they walked with him into the kitchen and had a moment of shameful regret. The boys needed a mom not a sex addict.

  “We’re ready!” Bo announced.

  I was ready. But Bo meant dinner, not sizzling sex with Gabe. I turned out of Gabe’s arm and headed to the kitchen. The food was all laid out on the table so we could fix our plates and take them to the backyard. I looked at TJ and Joel. “Don’t feed Ali any of this stuff. It’s not good for her.”

  They both rolled their eyes.

  “We know, Mom,” TJ said in teenage exasperation.

  Bo looked up from where he was serving bowls of jambalaya. “Feed my masterpiece to a dog?”

  I laughed at the outraged look on his face. “Go eat, Bo. I’ll finish dishing this up.” I elbowed him out of the way.

  “Come on, TJ and Joel. You can taste my food and tell me how gifted I am. Then I’ll do some magic for you.”

  “Awesome!” Joel took his plate and bowl, then bounced alongside Bo. “I can do the cups and balls trick. I’m pretty good. Grandpa says so. . . .” His voice faded.

  I looked up at Grandpa. “He loves magic.”

  He nodded. “He’s got passion for it. But he loves a lot of stuff, Sammy.”

  Warmth and love for this man washed up the back of my throat. I knew he wanted Joel to love magic like he did, but more than that, he wanted Joel to be Joel. “Either way, he’s lucky to have you.” I handed him his bowl of jambalaya. “Now go watch and make sure he doesn’t keep Bo from eating.” I grinned at him just as the front door flew open.

  Fletch limped into the house, stopping to pet Ali. “You would not believe my day!”

  I stared at him. Now he looked like Tobey Maguire after he’d been run over by a weed whacker. His brown hair sprung up here and there, his shirt was untucked, and his right pant leg was torn. “Fletch.” I moved out from the back of the table toward him. “What happened to you?”

  He stopped petting Ali and looked up at me with a slightly off-center grin. “I was looking at a dirt bike I wanted to rent. Somehow it fell and hit my leg.

  “Ouch,” I winced. That had to hurt.

  Fletch looked aro
und the house, then back to me. “I didn’t exactly notice how much it hurt right then ’cause I fell backward.”

  “Oh. Did you hit anything?” I forced real concern in my voice to cover up my first thought, which was that I had finally found a bigger klutz than me.

  “A row of those little dirt bikes. They went down like dominoes with me on the very top.”

  I heard two male snorts and turned around.

  Gabe and Cal stood there, both with straight faces. “Stop that,” I hissed. Their innocent faces didn’t fool me.

  Gabe moved past me and stuck his hand out. “I’m Gabe, and this is my brother, Cal.”

  Fletch shook their hands. “Hi, I’m Fletch. So you are Sam’s boyfriend. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

  Grandpa called out from the table. “Fletch, come on in and get some dinner. Bo cooked.”

  I looked over my shoulder at him. “Grandpa, can you serve Fletch dinner and I’ll get some ice for his leg?” I turned and headed around the corner of the kitchen and went to the freezer. I was grateful now that Grandpa had stayed home to do his Internet sleuthing and hadn’t gone with Fletch to the motorcycle shop. No telling what trouble the two of them would have gotten into. I filled a zip-lock bag with ice, then realized that Grandpa had served Fletch and taken him outside. That left Gabe and Cal to help themselves. They stood at the table with their backs to me, arguing.

  “Damn it, Cal,” Gabe said in a low voice, “let me contact a couple of my buddies from the department—”

  “No.” Cal threw a piece of bread on his plate, and then fixed a rock-hard glare on Gabe. “Stay out of it.” He turned and went out the sliding glass door.

  I saw Gabe’s shoulders tighten and rise. Still holding the ice, I moved up next to him. “Anything I can do?”

  He looked down at me and forced the corners of his mouth upward. “Not unless you want to hit him again.” He left too.

  I stood there alone in the house with the rich, spicy smells and a simmering anger. After setting the bag of ice down on the table, I poured myself a glass of wine and drank half of it.

  I did not like being cut out of Gabe’s life.

  I set the glass down, made a plate of food, and retrieved my glass and the ice bag. I started toward the door, then went back into the kitchen and snagged the wine bottle, managing to tuck it safely beneath my arm while juggling everything else.

  If I didn’t drink it, it would come in handy to hit the next male that kept a secret from me.

  As soon as I sat down across from Grandpa and next to Gabe, I handed Fletch the ice bag. Once I was settled, Bo lifted his wine glass. “I’d like to make a toast.”

  “Can we have wine so we can make the toast?” Joel asked.

  I looked past Gabe to Joel. “No.”

  “Bummer.” Joel lifted his glass of soda.

  Bo winked at TJ and Joel, then said, “To Fletch Knight and his well-deserved invitation to perform at the House of Cards.”

  Everyone cheered and drank. Ali thought all the noise was an invitation to play and ran around the two tables barking.

  Joel slipped Ali a crust of bread, then tried to keep me from noticing by saying, “Hey, Bo, when you do close-up magic, do you have to special order your stuff like the fake fingers to match your skin color?”

  I choked on my wine.

  Bo looked up and covered an amused expression. “Pass me the saltshaker.”

  I set my wine down and watched him. He took the saltshaker and unscrewed the lid. Then he folded one hand to create a hole at the top of his thumb and fingers. He lifted the salt and poured into the hole. He looked around the table, then tapped down the salt and opened his hands.

  The salt was gone.

  “Cool!” Joel said. “Bring it back.”

  Bo entertained all of us by dramatically making the salt reappear. Joel ran in the house to get his prop and did the same trick. Then he and Bo huddled and decided that there was very little difference in the color of their props.

  Basically, Bo was very light skinned, and when he performed a salt trick, people were trying to find where the salt went to and didn’t notice something like the end of his thumb being a little lighter or darker. Bo went on to explain that his goal was to keep the audience focused on the part of the illusion he wanted them to see.

  Fletch said, “Hey TJ, why don’t you show us your skill at counting cards.”

  Fletch was on the end of the table with his right leg propped up on a chair and the bag of ice on his calf. The lump was already turning vivid colors. I was really impressed that he thought to bring TJ into the conversation. That was nice of him.

  TJ shook his head. “Nah. That’s not magic.”

  Bo said, “You can count cards?”

  TJ shrugged.

  I knew he was pleased though, because I saw him glance up at Grandpa. And Grandpa smiled back.

  “He’s got a huge math brain,” Joel said, and looked at his brother. “Want me to get some cards?”

  “Later,” TJ said. Then he looked at Bo. “What is your good news?”

  That was TJ. He was happy just to have a little attention, but then he was even happier to turn the attention off himself.

  Bo glanced at me. I guessed that he was asking if he should let it drop about TJ counting cards. I nodded at him to go ahead with his news. He slipped his fake thumb into his pants pocket, took a sip of his wine, and announced in his deep velvety voice, “I’ll be signing a contract for a cartoon character based on my magic show. It’ll be called Magic Bo.”

  “Wow!” I was impressed. “Bo, that is fantastic!”

  Everyone else joined in.

  Bo’s face flooded with pleasure. “I don’t have all the details yet, but it’s been pretty exciting.”

  Grandpa raised his wineglass. “To Bo. You made it just like your dad and I knew you would!”

  We all drank to Bo. I thought about how good it was for Grandpa to have both Bo and Fletch here, two of his success stories to offset his guilt and anger over Shane.

  “Oh crap.”

  I heard the shatter of glass and looked over at Fletch.

  “Sorry.” He looked up and blushed. “My ice bag was falling. I grabbed for it and dropped the wineglass.” He took his leg off the chair. “Don’t get up. I’ll take care of it.”

  I stood. “No, sit down. I’ll get it. You just keep the ice on your leg.” I went into the kitchen and pulled a long length of paper towels off the roll, then got out the trash can. I went out and wiped up the broken glass and little bit of wine that had been left in the glass.

  “I’m really sorry, Sam.” Fletch watched me, looking dejected and miserable.

  He probably thought he ruined Bo’s big moment. “It’s not a big deal, Fletch. Do you want some more wine?”

  He relaxed. “Maybe coffee would be better.”

  I laughed. “I’ll make some and serve the dessert that Gabe brought.”

  Gabe got up. “I’ll help you.” He followed me into the kitchen.

  I put the trash can away and washed my hands. Gabe got started on brewing the coffee. He was silent and seemed tired. I’m sure tearing down a wall and fighting with his brother wore him out.

  I glanced out the window over the sink, then I said quietly, “You don’t have to stay to help me with the investigation tonight. Maybe you and Cal should talk.”

  He poured in the water, set the carafe under the drip, then turned on the machine. Then he settled his dark gaze on me. “You already have all the help you need, is that it?”

  I had the feeling he was looking for a fight. “No.” I took a deep breath and tried to keep my temper under control. “I thought that maybe you were tired and maybe you needed to work something out with your brother.” What help was he talking about? “So far, no one has been any help, and no one knows what the hell Shane Masters is up to.”

  Fletch limped into the kitchen. “Sam, Barney and I are looking into Shane. Don’t worry, it’ll be okay.”

  I looked
at Fletch as he carried the dripping ice bag. He walked around Gabe and came to where I stood to dump the melting ice in the sink. “Grandpa told you?”

  He looked up. “Yes. After you left this morning, he told me about Shane’s accusation. Then I came by this afternoon to see if he wanted to go look at dirt bikes, and he told me you two went to see Shane. Barney needs my help. The two of us will find out what’s going on.” Fletch drew his eyebrows together. “Don’t look so upset. Barney is worried because Shane threatened you. Shane doesn’t even know I’m in town. He probably doesn’t even know I exist. I’ll help Barney.”

  The sausage in the jambalaya burned in my stomach. Grandpa hadn’t told me anything until he’d had to. He still hadn’t told me about mentoring Shane, though he must realize that Rosy told me. But he told Fletch about Shane. What else did Grandpa tell him and not me? “Did he tell you where he was last night?” He’d told me he went to see a friend. I hadn’t had the chance to press him for more information yet. I knew he hadn’t gone to see Shane, but who had he gone to see?

  Fletch shook his head. “I didn’t ask him. Do you want me to?”

  The anger washed the taste of acid up the back of my throat. I went to the pantry and pulled out a stack of paper plates, some napkins, and a box of plastic forks. I set them on the counter and glanced at Fletch. “Sure, if you think of it, ask him.”

  “Umm.” Fletch glanced at me, then Gabe who stood silently by the coffeemaker, then added, “Okay, but is something wrong, Sam?”

  I lifted the lid of the dessert Gabe had brought.

  Chocolate cake.

  And I didn’t want it due to the lump of misery in my stomach. “Everything is fine.” I got a cake knife out of the drawer and started slicing the dessert. I handed Fletch a couple plates of cake. “Go take this outside.”

  After he left, Gabe moved up beside me. “You didn’t tell me Shane threatened you.”

  I stopped cutting and looked up. “It was implied, and that was the reason Grandpa had been trying to keep me out of this thing with Shane. You and I haven’t had time to sit down and go over this.”

  “You found time to have lunch with Vance.”