And then Hilary had stepped in and changed her destiny…
Maybe, if she hadn’t gone through that humiliating experience, she would still be with boring, old Simon, maybe even married to him, and not about to start a relationship with her dream man. Things happened for a reason, and if that humiliation was the price she had to pay for a lifetime with her soulmate, she’d pay it—gladly.
CHAPTER 13
Ruby’s landline began to ring. She snatched it up and snarled, “What?” sure it would be Hilary calling to apologize.
“Ruby, I’m sorry, you were right. That was Jeremy,” Hilary said.
“Told you. So, what happened?” she said, propping her feet on the coffee table.
“I wanted to also say I’m sorry I didn’t believe you about Curtis. Motherfucker. If I knew where he was now, I’d give him a piece of my mind!”
Ruby was touched. “He’s dead now, so no worries.”
“What?”
“Sarah called and told me eons ago. He died of some allergic reaction. Bees, maybe? I can’t remember. Anyway, Sarah was practically crowing about it. Good riddance. Now, about Jeremy?”
“Oh, him. He sat and talked to me while we waited for the tow truck. I thought he was a nice guy before I realized he was a creeper.”
Ruby sat forward and thumped her feet on the ground. “Yes! What tipped you off?”
“I don’t know.…Yes I do. He sat way too close to me, and he asked too many questions, and he acted like he had all the time in the world to wait on the tow truck driver. And he pumped me for information about you—”
“How the hell did he pull that off? You thought he was some random, stranded man. Why would he assume you knew me?”
“I have that cartoon you signed for me framed on the wall, and he said he was a fan. The way he brought you up was so natural that I would have thought nothing of it if you hadn’t already warned me. He asked if we knew each other.”
“You didn’t tell him anything?”
“Of course not.” Hilary said. “When he started questioning me about you, I clammed up. I thought you were just being paranoid, but I gave you the benefit of the doubt.”
“Thanks for nothing.”
Hilary sighed. “Do we have to fight? After all, I called to let you say, ‘I told you so.’”
Ruby fought a grin. “That’s true,” she said. “I told you so. What did he ask about me?”
“Oh, how long we’d been friends, how we met, what you were like, and I was just very vague. And by the way, how’d you get back inside your house without your keys? Did you break a window? And for that matter, how’d you get home? If you rode your bike all the way back, yer a stud.”
Ruby smiled. “Nah, I’m a wuss. I used my spare key to get in, and Sean drove me home from the coffee shop. But what happened with—”
“That’s right! You went out with Sean! How did that happen?”
She could hardly wait to fill her friend in on her date with Sean, but she also wanted to hear the rest of Hilary’s story. Her curiosity won out. “I can’t wait to tell you! But first, tell me how you found out he was Jeremy. Was it his license plates that gave him away?”
“Yes. I walked him outside when the tow truck driver arrived, and I saw “PLAYER” on his plates immediately. Lemme tell you, I was scared to death. I didn’t know what to do, and then the tow truck driver asked him to try starting his car, ‘cause maybe he just needed a jump-start, and it started right away—no problem!” She lowered her voice. “So, I think maybe he lied about having car trouble just so he could come inside my house!” she sounded indignant.
Ruby rolled her eyes. “Of course, he lied about the car trouble. He’s stalking me. He was using you to get to me.”
“Have you called the police?”
“Not yet.”
“You should,” Hilary said. “He scares me.”
“Me too. You didn’t confront him when you found out who he was?”
“Are you crazy? Maybe I would have, if Tom were here, but he won’t be home until Thursday. I’m all alone out here, and Jeremy’s obviously unstable.”
“Do you think I should confront him?” Ruby said.
“No! Stay away from him.”
“But I don’t want him thinking he got away with this tonight. I want him to know that I know he was at your house.”
“Ruby, let it go. Promise me. No good can come from this.”
Ruby hesitated. She could not just let it go. He needed to know that she was on to him. But she wouldn’t tell Hilary that. “Okay. You’re probably right. Now, will you please, please, pretty please drive my car back here? I can’t be without a vehicle and I miss my phone.”
Hilary sighed. “All right. Quit yer whining.…Uh-oh.”
“Uh oh, what?”
“Your keys are gone,” Hilary said.
“What?”
“Don’t worry. I’ll find them. They have to be here. I remember putting all your stuff together on the coffee table, and your wallet and phone are still here…”
“Look on the floor. Look underneath the couch.”
“I did. I am. They’re not here,” Hilary said. “And I couldn’t miss ‘em, your key ring’s gigantic. That’s so bad for your starter to hang so much weight—”
“My Mini has a Circle Key Fob, not a regular key.”
“Well, that’s gone too. You really should get rid of—”
“Hilary!”
She sighed. “Anyway, I’m sure I’ll find them.”
A horrifying thought occurred to Ruby. “Do you think Jeremy could have stolen them?”
Hilary gasped. She was quiet for a few moments, before she finally said, “…No. He wasn’t alone long enough.”
Something about Hilary’s doubtful tone alerted her. “Are you sure? You left him alone so we could talk in the kitchen. How long does it take to toss keys in your pocket? If he stole them, game’s over.” Almost every key she owned was on that ring. House key, car key, mail key, bike lock key. She slapped a hand over her mouth. And, the key to her secret Sean drawer in her coffee table…
“They have to be here. I’ll look around,” Hilary promised.
Wait a minute. Jeremy was her landlord. He already had her housekeys. He didn’t need to steal them. Her anxiety lowered for a second before climbing again. “What about my phone? My wallet?”
“Your phone’s dead again, of course, but it looks fine,” Hilary said. “Your wallet still has your license, assorted cards and twelve dollars and change inside. So, unless you had more—”
“I didn’t.”
“Then I must have misplaced your keys. We’re being paranoid.”
“More hassles.”
You have another set, right? Another fob?”
“Somewhere,” Ruby said morosely.
“So, use ‘em. Now, tell me what happened with Sean!”
And with a sigh of pleasure, Ruby did.
▬▬▬
Ruby was smiling when she hung up her phone. She picked it up again almost immediately and dialed Sean’s number. Talking about him with Hilary had whet her appetite.
Hilary had tried to talk her out of this, saying the next move should be his, but Ruby disagreed. The only way she had a chance against the unknown Tara was to keep popping up so he couldn’t forget her.
The phone was answered by a young child. “Heyo?” Ruby caught her breath in excitement. Danny! She pitched her voice high and friendly and said, “Well hello there. Is this Danny?”
“Yeah,” the little boy said. “Ask who it is,” she heard Sean say. And then Danny said, “Who dis is?”
“Hi Danny, this is,” she cleared her throat and crossed her fingers, “…Ruby. Is your Daddy there?”
“Daddy! Daddy! Here.”
She heard Sean ask, “Who is it?”
“It not mommy.”
Ruby glared at the phone. She’d told that stupid kid who she was. Maybe he shouldn’t be answering the phone if he couldn’t take a simple
message. Now Sean might think she was Tara. That is, if Tara wasn’t already there—
“Hello?” Sean said in a guarded tone.
Ruby cleared her throat and said brightly, “Sean? It’s Ruby Deardon? From this afternoon?” Oh please, let him be happy to hear from her!
His wary tone vanished, replaced by cheerfulness. “Hello again. What’s going on?”
She sighed in relief. He probably hadn’t wanted to talk to Tara anyway. “I’m sorry to bother you while you’re with your son. I’ll get off quickly so you can—”
“Don’t worry about it. We’re watching ‘Moana’ for about the nine-millionth time, and believe me,” he lowered his voice, “I’m not missing anything. So, what’s up?”
Her thumb was throbbing, and when she glanced down, she saw that she’d torn her thumbnail to shreds. She rubbed it on her shirt and snagged the fabric. “I just wanted to thank you again for the ride home and the coffee. I had a wonderful time.”
“No problem. Hey, let me give you my cell number, this one’s…it’s not really mine.”
“Thank you!” She scribbled it down in her notebook, wishing again that she had her cell phone. “Well…um,” she thought of something. “Are you on Facebook? I couldn’t find you. We could be Facebook buddies.” She tried to say this in a non-stalkerish way and must have succeeded because he chuckled.
“I’d be surprised if you had found me. I do have a Facebook account, but it’s not under my name.”
“What name is it under then?” she asked, pen poised.
“Um, Troglodyte Franklin.”
“Not the Troglodyte Franklin,” she said. “As I live and breathe.”
“Yeah, it’s a long story. My friend Jenny started it. There’s a whole family of us Franklins. …It’s kind of stupid.”
“I’ll send you a friend request. I assume you’re the only Troglodyte on there?”
“Oh, I highly doubt that,” he said, and she let out a surprised giggle, completely charmed.
What else could she ask him? “And, uh, I’d also like to invite you to a…kind of a party I’m having next Saturday.”
He didn’t answer for a moment, and she held her breath. “I’d love to come, but I have Danny on the weekends.”
“Oh no,” Ruby said, before she could help herself. “I mean, not that that’s bad—”
“But maybe I can swap nights with Millicent. We do that sometimes.”
“You’d do that for me?” Ruby said, suddenly on the verge of tears.
“I’ll ask her, at least. What’s the occasion?”
Her mind went blank. “It’s sort of a…welcome home party for my friend’s husband? He’s been gone fishing for over a month.”
She began punching her thigh with her left hand. Why hadn’t she called it an early Halloween party? Or…She did the math in her head and realized his actual thirtieth birthday was next Sunday and hers was the day after, so she could’ve just said it was her birthday party, then he would naturally mention his, and she could’ve made it a double party—she was so dumb! And Hilary was going to want some alone time with Tom…
“Are you sure you want us there? I mean, we don’t know your friend or her husband.”
“…Us?” This wasn’t a party for children.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I just assumed that you meant me and Tara.” He sounded embarrassed. “I shouldn’t have.”
Ruby felt a scream gathering in her throat and swallowed it down. “Of course, she can come. The more the merrier!” she said with forced brightness.
“Should we bring anything?”
“Just yourself…oh, and Tara of course. Can’t forget her, right?”
“Uh, right. What time should we stop by?”
“Come around 6:30. It’s a dinner party. You’re not a vegetarian, are you?”
“Me? Nah. But Tara’s vegan.”
“Of course, she is. Bless her heart.”
“What?”
“So! I hope to see you next Saturday at 6:30. You remember how to get here?”
“Of course. I’m looking forward to it. See you then.”
“Bye.” She hung up and danced around the living room. Sean Chaplin was coming to her house! Which meant she had less than a week to break Tara and him up. That frigging tramp was not welcome here.
She glanced at her drawing table and sighed. She wanted to work on her new toons, but they could wait.
She grabbed her laptop and went on Facebook. Troglodyte Franklin was so private his profile picture was Chloe, his dog. She sent him a friend request, grabbed a notebook, and began planning the perfect party.
Martha Stewart, eat your heart out.
CHAPTER 14
Early Sunday morning, Hilary picked Ruby up and drove her to the hardware store. Ruby planned to call a locksmith first thing tomorrow morning to change the locks on the front and back doors. She knew it was going to be expensive, and she didn’t want to pay weekend prices on top of it. Monday would be cheaper, and considering it was just a stopgap until she found another place to live where Jeremy was not her landlord, the cheaper the better.
Hilary yawned. “I am so exhausted. I’m out of sleeping pills with no refills for a month.”
“Really?” Ruby said, keeping her voice blank.
“I think Jeremy stole my new bottle when he was at my house!”
“I wouldn’t put it past him,” Ruby said.
At the store, Hilary made a beeline for the garden center, while Ruby looked at fire safes. Eventually, she placed the largest, heaviest one in her cart.
She roamed the store, halfheartedly searching for Hilary, while filling her cart with a chain for her front door, a doorbell camera, and an expensive pair of bright yellow and black walkie talkies that had a range of over two miles.
She finally found Hilary, hands full of seed packets, looking wistfully at an expensive, outdoor hanging chair. Hilary tossed her seeds into the cart. “You know walkie talkies are obsolete, right?” she said, holding up her cellphone.
Ruby bought them anyway.
Hilary drove them back to her house. “You wanna stay for brunch?” she asked. “I’ll make mimosas.”
But Ruby was already unlocking her car door. “Sorry,” she said, ignoring Hilary’s crestfallen face. “But I’m behind on deadline.”
On the way home she turned the radio up, thrilled to have her car back, and that she’d dodged the brunch invite. Hilary really was easier to take in small doses.
When she got home, Ruby opened the doorbell camera and realized it was way too complicated for her limited mechanical skills. Maybe she’d bribe Hilary to come install it tomorrow.
Using a screwdriver and her hammer, she broke the lock on her coffee table drawer, and transferred her Sean stuff to her new safe. She then hid the key and dragged the safe into her bedroom closet.
She frowned. The safe really needed to be bolted to the floor. She’d ask Hilary to do it when she came to install the doorbell camera.
She started a honey-do list for her friend.
The rest of the day was quiet. Ruby screened her calls, worked on her new cartoons with the Donovan character, and stalked Sean’s Facebook page—which was depressing. Sean had over two hundred friends, but he hadn’t posted in a year, and all eleven of his pictures were crowd scenes that he’d been tagged in. Still, she made sure to like and comment on them all.
When she checked her work email, there was a message from her editor, Hal Stout. “No cartoons this week?”
She rolled her eyes and closed her email, not bothering to answer. She knew for a fact that a famous cartoonist at her syndicate perpetually ran right at deadline, and his papers were occasionally forced to put out reruns when he had a dry week. And here Hal was being passive-aggressive with her for being twelve hours late uploading her finished strips.
She could’ve made deadline, but she’d been so distracted by Sean and Jeremy, she’d forgotten to turn them in.
She opened each saved cartoon on her desktop
and read through them quickly before logging on to her syndicate’s bulletin board. It took less than two minutes to upload the entire bunch electronically. She was so glad she was a present-day cartoonist, with access to Photoshop and computers instead of being forced to send original art by snail mail.
Her new Donovan cartoons were her best work yet, and she couldn’t wait to get the first installment done so she could send them to Hal for validation.
She was overflowing with ideas. She had two full months written out ready to draw, and she’d never managed to get ahead by more than a week before. Maybe she could finally take a real vacation. With Sean.
Hello, honeymoon!
▬▬▬
Tomorrow was trash day. Ruby looked over at the two bags against the wall in the kitchen and sighed. She needed a man around, if only to take out the trash.
It was 11:05 p.m. If she left the bags until tomorrow morning, she’d never beat the garbage men. They were out clanking cans around and screaming at each other at 5 a.m. every damn Monday morning.
She put down her new scrapbook, now filled with all 317 pictures of Sean’s grass-cutting extravaganza, slipped on her Birkenstocks, and dragged the bigger of the two bags across the room. When she opened the front door, she was startled to see a vase full of at least two dozen red roses perched on the top step of her deck.
She dropped the bag, sat down beside them, leaned over, and inhaled deeply. There was no scent. But still, no one had ever gotten her roses before, and now this was twice in one week. Once from Jeremy, and once from…
Her throat went dry. Hopefully, they were from Sean. She searched through the flowers—there might even be three dozen here—and located a small card.
The writing was cramped, and she had to squint to make it out in the scant light from the porch light. It said:
“Ruby. I’ve been calling you all day. I left thirteen messages before you turned off your machine. You won’t return my calls, you won’t answer the door, so I thought these might get your attention.” She turned the card over and continued, “I’m sorry we quarreled, but we can work it out. Our relationship’s worth it! I’m begging for another chance. Come on over, I’m right next door. I love you with all my heart, Jeremy.”
Drawn To You: A Psychological thriller Page 12
