What I Remember Most

by Cathy Lamb

  When he lost at trial, the home would be sold immediately, as would Covey’s other homes in various places, including Mexico. They would sell his fancy cars, all lined up in the six-car garage next door, three boats, five motorcycles, a small plane, a motor home we never used, and my jewelry. He would then sit in a jail cell and have tons of time to think and be a dick.

  I walked through each room. I had never felt like I fit into this life, or this home—Covey’s home. It felt foreign to me, ostentatious, and loud. Covey had hired an interior decorator before I met him, and she had done her thing and charged him a fortune. It was snobby and obnoxious. It screamed of wealth and a man who had low self-esteem and needed to brag.

  Why hadn’t I seen that before I married him?

  I headed to the immense kitchen with its own brick fireplace, an island long enough to land his plane on, and a massive amount of white cabinets with gold handles. I thought of the endless dinner parties we’d had here.

  I felt the exhaustion I’d felt then. The frustration. Tears. A breaking marriage. After a dinner party, Covey would have to “make a call,” and I’d clean up. He was sound asleep when I climbed into bed, but he’d wake up and want me to work on him, too. He was enraged when I eventually told him, after months of that crap, that after working all day, making dinner and cleaning up, or hosting a hundred people at a catered event, I didn’t want to have to make, bake, and clean him up, too.

  I ran my hands over my face. Why had I taken that? Why had I allowed myself to be in that relationship for as long as I had?

  Covey’s den was covered in wood paneling. As I now knew much more about wood, I realized that even in a home like this, the quality was nowhere near what Kade worked with. Not even on the same planet.

  Covey’s computer and the contents of his desk had been confiscated, but his books were still there—which he had ordered online so he could stack them behind his desk and pretend that he had read all those literary works.

  I opened the door to our bedroom, with its view of the city. We had a fireplace, a thick rug in front of it, a couch in white, and two padded white chairs with gold pillows. The bedroom was much larger than my whole home over the barn. The bathroom had a tub big enough for four, a shower for two, and granite counters.

  I felt a rush of anger so hot I could hardly breathe when I finally brought my gaze around to the king-sized, four-poster bed and the white lace draped over it. Mind games, emotional games, sex games. Burned onto a DVD. It all culminated right there, in an act that should have had love in it.

  I turned away and opened my closet doors. Those clothes weren’t me anymore. The heels, the silk, the lace, the designer outfits. The handbags. They weren’t me from the start. Covey bought them for me, pouted if I didn’t wear them, his ego hurt, and I gave in.

  Why did I do that? Why did I wear something I wasn’t comfortable in?

  My fury rose to the ceiling. Fury at him, but fury with myself. I allowed my brain, my life, and myself to be hijacked.

  He had indulged in criminal activities and had me sign papers to not only implicate me in his schemes but to hold over my head. He told the authorities I was the “mastermind” of his business because I left him. He threatened me. When he could have saved me, he didn’t, even when I was locked up in jail. He was willing to let me make a plea deal and go to jail again.

  I picked up a wedding photo and hurtled it across the room, a raw scream breaking free. The frame made a hole in the wall and shattered.

  I threw the rest of the photos of us against the wall, the glass splintering, then I started in on the expensive stuff in the room—vases and artwork, curtains I ripped down, and lamps from around the world I knew he was proud of. I threw. I smashed. I put more holes in the wall. My temper triggered and storming, I stomped down the hall to my art studio.

  How could I pack all of the supplies I’d left behind—my collections of colorful rocks, my stamps from all over the world, old photos of a circus I’d found in an antique shop, game pieces, mosaic tiles, colorful glass—plus my red chair, which I loved. Would it fit in the car if I shoved hard?

  I opened my studio door, still steaming, and there was . . . nothing. It was all gone. Cardboard boxes littered the floor, along with newspapers and tin cans I’d stored brushes in. My jars and boxes filled with beads, yarn, dice, dollhouse furniture, sparkly jewelry, feathers, Scrabble letters, rocks and shells, gone. My fabrics and lace, gone.

  The rest of my art books, the colorful dressers and shelves I’d had from my little green home, my canvases, my plants and precious bonsai trees, even my red chair . . . gone.

  There was nothing.

  This was what Covey was talking about. He’d destroyed my art studio.

  He hadn’t taken the clothes and purses and heels. He knew I didn’t care about those things.

  But I cared about this.

  So he trashed it.

  I leaned against the wall, tears of frustration, of loss, streaming down my face. I hated him so much.

  On my way out I stopped at the home of the principal of the elementary school where I used to teach art. Keesha James was surprised to see me but gave me an exuberant hug. “Dina Wild! I am so glad to see you. The kids miss your art class like you would not believe.”

  She invited me in for coffee, and we chatted. I told her briefly what had happened, including that all charges had been dropped against me. It was important to me that she knew that, as I liked her and we’d worked together for years.

  “I knew you were innocent! I met your husband that one time and I thought to myself, Now that is sleeze in a suit. No offense.”

  “None taken.”

  I gave her three collages I’d packed into my car. They were in a closet next to the studio. Obviously Covey had forgotten about them. “For you to sell, or auction off, at your Back to School Night, for art supplies for the kids.”

  She was thrilled. She was teary. She begged me to come back.

  “I can’t. I’m sorry.” I felt the weight on my shoulders, so heavy, begin to lift, like a thousand feathers were lifting the rocks off my shoulders. “I have a new life.”

  I dropped off Divinity Star’s mural of the carousel. When I arrived at her house, she was having a meeting with her fellow friends and time travelers who believed that they all had past lives. They were each dressed in costumes that reflected who they had been before: Joan of Arc, a cave woman, a nun, a 1920s flapper girl, a pioneer woman, a fairy. The fairy didn’t fit, but whatever.

  When Divinity Star saw her collage, she screamed. “Dina! I love it. This is where all my past lives started!”

  I know, Divinity, I know. I hugged her.

  I rolled down the windows as soon as I was outside of the city, pulled out my ponytail, and let the wind whip my hair around. I was crushed about my art studio. It had taken years to amass what I had. My art supplies had been so personal, from the bottle caps, to the clothespins I’d painted in rainbow colors, to the blue and green sea glass.

  What was done was done. I decided not to stay in my anger for one more minute because that would mean Covey had control over my emotions. I would go to Goodwill, I would go to thrift and antique shops, I would go to art stores and restock my art supplies.

  I felt like I was shedding Covey and his evilness as I drove farther and farther away from town. Shedding his muck and manipulations, his suffocating personality, his mercilessness.

  Shedding jail.

  Shedding the FBI, the assistant U.S. attorney, the IRS, the human calculator.

  Shedding my life as Dina Hamilton, wife of Covey Hamilton, investor, possessive and dangerous husband, criminal. Shedding Dina Wild, too. The woman I had become during high school because I didn’t want to be named after a syrup for a drink and because I was trying to start over.

  I was Grenadine Scotch Wild again. Grenady for short. The name given to me when I was a baby by my mom and dad, Freedom and Bear Wild. The name I would not give up again. That girl/teenager/woman had bee
n through many hard things, but she was now a free woman, an artist, a friend, and totally in love with Kade Hendricks.

  I smiled, then I laughed. I thought of that man without his jeans and T-shirts and thermals and cowboy boots. Plain naked.

  My, oh my. He was delicious. Lots of steely muscle and hard buttocks and a broad back to stroke and caress. What hung between those two legs like a bull stallion was heaven itself.

  I turned on the radio to cheerful, powerful hard-core . . . country music.

  I sang aloud—not well, not on tune, but loud.

  50

  He loved being a poet.

  He tore off a small corner of his poem book and chewed on it. He liked pigs, too.

  He wrote a new nursery rhyme.

  This little piggy went up the hill.

  This little piggy fought back.

  This little piggy hit him.

  This little piggy had a nice rack.

  And this little piggy went wee wee wee all through the forest Until she was gone.

  All gone.

  This little piggy was under a rock.

  This little piggy was, too.

  They had company there, Though none had to go to the loo.

  He’d lost the littlest piggy. He screamed, as loud as he could, head back. She had ruined it! Ruined it all! He crumbled up the poem and put it in his mouth. “Now you’re stuck in there, Danny. You’re stuck, you can’t get out!”

  He put both hands on his hair and pulled.

  51

  It was midnight when I drove through the quiet Wild West town, by the cowboy on the bucking horse, and headed up my driveway.

  I said hello to Liddy. She neighed, and I neighed back and gave her an apple.

  Then I skipped up the stairs of the big, red barn. On my door was a detailed picture, drawn with colored pencils, of a quilt. It was of three women, their butts way in the air, slinking through the grass wearing night goggles, miniskirts, and bikini tops over well-endowed bosoms. Rozlyn wrote at the top, “I will call it the Spy Girls quilt. Love you, Roz.”

  I turned on all the lights, threw my arms out, and spun like a kid. I lit candles and sunk into my bath and washed my hair. I added too much strawberry scented bubble bath

  Dale had told me that my checking, savings, and retirement accounts for me and my business would be released to me immediately. I would not have to give up the money I had now, either. I could pay off Cherie.

  I was not broke. In fact, I had money. I felt better. Not because I wanted anything fancy, but because I needed financial security. I needed to feel safe. I needed to know I could handle tomorrow and all the bullets life shot at me.

  I would stay in this apartment over the red barn to be with Cleo and to help Rozlyn. If Rozlyn died, I would move into her house to keep Cleo’s surroundings the same, and raise Cleo. When she was raised, I would move out, and Cleo would have her mother’s home, as it should be.

  Later that night, tucked into bed, covered in my white comforter with the pretty pink roses, I hugged myself. I loved my bed. I didn’t love it quite as much as I loved Kade’s bouncy, cuddly bed with the married-for-life bald eagles, but I still loved it.

  I held my pink ceramic rose box and placed my lily bracelet inside of it.

  Home.

  That night I dreamed that I heard my parents’ laughter. I saw my father’s fingers strumming the guitar. I saw my mother’s red, crocheted shawl.

  I felt a kiss on my cheek.

  All will be well.

  At six o’clock in the morning, I turned on my computer and looked up The Oregon Journal. I was so hopeful, and so scared. I didn’t want any more attention—except the type of attention that cleared my name.

  The article was on the front page of the metro section, at the top. My heart thudded. The headline, “All charges dropped against Dina Hamilton, wife of disgraced investor Covey Hamilton.”

  The article detailed the charges against us, Hamilton Investments, the investigation, the amount of client money lost, and that I worked as a painter and collage artist and had been married to Covey for one year before starting divorce proceedings.

  The highlights . . .

  “The case against Dina Hamilton was complicated by several factors, mostly by Covey Hamilton, who was furious that Dina left him and was threatening to take her down with him unless she came home. He lied repeatedly about her and her involvement in his company. Dina had nothing to do with Hamilton Investments. It’s a typical controlling husband type of case....

  “Covey Hamilton is still declaring his innocence, although sources have told The Oregon Journal that his attorneys are talking with the U.S. attorney’s office and trying to negotiate his prison sentence.

  “Asked why Dina Hamilton initially plead not guilty, then changed her plea to guilty, assistant U.S. attorney, Dale Kotchik said, ‘Dina Hamilton has a friend who has two years to live. The friend is suffering from a brain tumor and Dina is the guardian of the friend’s child. Had a jury found Dina guilty, she would have received at least a five-year prison term. By pleading guilty without a trial she would have received eighteen months in prison, which guaranteed that she would be out in time to tend to her friend and to care for the friend’s young daughter. She decided not to risk it. When she told us she would be pleading guilty, we were already well aware of her innocence—from numerous sources—and never would have allowed her to go to trial, much less jail.’ ”

  I had mixed emotions. I was thrilled to be publicly declared innocent, but my stomach sank. I slapped my hands to my cheeks and bent my head. This was also terrible. Pineridge is a small town, and now Rozlyn’s secret was out. I never expected it to land in the paper. I would need to beg forgiveness.

  I hoped that Covey would be beaten in prison, attacked by bats, stung by fleas, infested by lice, and stabbed with homemade prison weapons.

  But for me it was all over.

  I made coffee and put whipping cream in it, then went outside and watched the sunrise.

  Peace.

  Kade called me at seven.

  “I saw the newspaper.” I heard the hope in his deep voice, the gravelly intensity. “Where are you?”

  “Home. I came in late last night.”

  I heard a long pause. I thought he might be crying. When he spoke, I knew he was, that gentle bear. “I’m inviting myself over, honey. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

  “Really?” My voice was embarrassingly breathless.

  “Yep.”

  I knew it would be more than five minutes, but I still flew to my shower, brushed my hair, ignored the scars on my hairline, as usual, put hair goop in, let it wave down, brushed my teeth, and put on makeup.

  I pulled on jeans and a white, lacy negligee and a white blouse. I put on dangly earrings with red stones and a red stone necklace.

  The doorbell rang.

  A second later, I was holding onto Kade, my legs wrapped around his hips, like I would never let go.

  A few seconds later, I was up in his arms and he was dumping me on my bed with the white comforter and pink roses.

  “I missed you,” I panted between heated, tingly, long kisses.

  “I missed you, too, Grenady. I love you, Artist Lady.”

  “Love you, too.”

  We stopped talking. Action speaks so much louder than words and our action was lusty . . . and loving.

  Tender and loving.

  Love and lust. Your best friend and your passionate lover. In one.

  The best combination.

  Afterward, Kade wrapped me up in a hug on top of his chest. I felt his heart beating right beneath my cheek.

  I tried not to cry, but I did. Right there. On top of Kade. So many, many tears. He held me close and made soft murmuring sounds. He kissed my cheeks and my forehead while I choked on my sobs and snuffled and sniffled. He cried, too, that sexy hit man with a soft heart.

  I pulled back, still crying, and said, “I’m making you all wet,” and he chuckled and said, “You can ma
ke me all wet anytime,” and hugged me close. “I’m so glad you’re home.”

  “Me too, stud, me too.”

  I apologized to Rozlyn up one side and down another that I had not kept her secret, told her I never thought it would end up in the paper, that I thought it was confidential, and she was gracious and kind.

  “Grenady, my partner in spying, I understand and I don’t mind at all. I have to tell people right away anyhow because of the last-ditch chemo they’re trying, and I’m losing my crowning glory hair soon, so it doesn’t matter. I love you, girlfriend.”

  “Me too, Rozlyn.”

  “And I have a confession.” Her face scrunched up and she burst into tears.

  “Oh no. We don’t need any more of those.” I wrapped my arms around her, aching for her pain.

  “I have to apologize to you. I know that in my heart, or back in my busted brain, that you were taking the eighteen months for Cleo and me.”

  “It was the better bet.”

  “A bet for us.” She held my hand, still crying, hiccupping.

  “That, too.”

  “And I didn’t urge you to fight more. I didn’t insist you go to trial because I wanted you out in eighteen months for Cleo.” She had a hot flash, sweat pouring, like the elf was back with his hose. I wiped her forehead with my fingers. I don’t think I’m going to like menopause.

  “It was all about me and my daughter.” She wiped her tears away with both hands, then fanned herself. “Us. Me. I’m so sorry, Grenady.”

  “Nothing to apologize for.” And there wasn’t. “I’m sure I would have done the same thing.”

  “Please forgive me, Grenady. I’m begging you.”

  “Done. Forgiven. How about we eat some chocolate?”

  “Excellent.” She sniffled. “It’s an aphrodisiac, and I’m going to get the guts to ask out Leonard before I lose my hair, so I need it.” Rozlyn ran a hand over her curves. “Two hundred twenty-five pounds of chocolate lust. Right here. Ready and waiting for Leonard.”