The Angel Tasted Temptation

by Shirley Jump

  "Man, you're going to miss a killer party. I hear he's getting strippers." Kenny sauntered over to the toilet and sat down on the closed lid. He picked up last month's issue of Playboy and began flipping through the pages, pausing to drool over women he'd never have.

  "I'm done, Kenny."

  "Yeah, I'm pretty toasted myself, man. I am done. D-O"— belch— "N."

  "E."

  "E?" Kenny blinked at him, his brown eyes bleary. Spindly red lines crackled across the surface, like a map of the interstate highway system.

  Travis shook his head. "Never mind. I'm done with parties. And women. And acting like I'm seventeen."

  Kenny scratched his head, his sleep-styled dark brown hair flopping with the movement. "Why?"

  "Because—"

  "Travis Campbell, I am going to kill you!" The bathroom door burst open and in strode a redhead in high heels, a clingy white pantsuit with matching trench, and an oversized bright plum-colored purse.

  He'd met her last night. Or was it last week? Damn. All those parties had started to run together, like a river of tequila and vodka.

  Her name started with a T, that much he remembered. Tiffany. Maybe Tammy.

  "I'm in the bathroom," Travis said to her, indicating the sink and Kenny on the toilet with his magazine. She stood on his linoleum, clearly not caring that she'd walked in on his morning ablutions. The bright blue shower curtain behind her looked like one of those TV blue screens, making Travis feel like the whole thing was surreal, unnatural.

  Or maybe that was the leftover rum in his system talking.

  "Listen," he said, rubbing his head, "can we talk about this later?"

  She parked a fist on her hip, the purse swinging to the front. "You don't remember me, do you?"

  "Of course I do." Tawny. Terry.

  "Then what's my name?"

  He swallowed. Beside him, he could see Kenny smirking. Damn. Why couldn't she have shown up after the Tylenol had had a chance to start working?

  Tara. Tess. Tilda.

  Shit. He'd about run out of T names and not one had felt mentally right. He'd take his last resort then— turn the tables on Thomasina-Thelma-Tasha. "Listen, you clearly don't like me anymore. Wouldn't it be best if we forget about each other? Move on. Get a little closure?"

  If he spouted enough Dr. Phil maybe she'd leave.

  "Oh, I won't forget you," she said. "Or what you did to me."

  "What I did to you?" Oh shit. What the hell did she mean by that? He'd been drunk, but not that drunk.

  Had he?

  "I-I-I—" She sniffled, shook her head, then directed her gaze at him again. "I thought you loved me."

  Travis swallowed. Had he used that word? That alone was a sign he was drinking too much. That was it. The rest of the case of beer was going down the drain.

  Wait. That might be too rash. Better just to put it in the bottom bin of the refrigerator. Outta sight, outta mind, outta mouth and outta trouble.

  "How could you think that?" Travis asked. "I barely—" He caught himself before he said remember you, and reworded. "We barely dated."

  "I felt a connection." She swiped at her eyes. "Right in the first few minutes, when we started talking on Brian's sofa."

  Brian's sofa. Okay, he remembered a conversation with a redhead—Tori, Trista, Trixie—at Bri's party last night, but nothing that would have caused him to hear wedding bells ringing. "Uh, I'm sure we had a great conversation ..."

  Toni. Tracy. Tricia.

  "... but I think you got the wrong idea," he said.

  "Oh, you do, do you?" She pursed her lips. "I only got the idea you gave me, Travis."

  He put up his hands. "Hey, I'm not a commitment kind of guy. It was a pleasure meeting you last night, but—"

  She cocked her head to the right and zeroed in on his gaze. "You don't remember me at all. Do you?"

  "Well, I—" He finished on a self-deprecating half laugh that he hoped begged forgiveness and turned on whatever charm he had left after a night of drinking and making a fool out of himself. "I'm sorry—"

  "Olivia Tate, you jerk!" And then she swung the massive purse right at his head.

  He wasn't prepared for a pocketbook blow. He felt a slam—what'd she have in there? A watermelon?— then felt himself fall to the floor in a crumpled, hungover heap.

  From his vantage point, he watched a pair of black heels pivot and stomp out of his bathroom. Behind him, Kenny laughed so hard, Travis could hear the pages of Playboy fluttering like applause.

  Her last name started with a T. His first name was the one that began with T. No wonder the Budweiser company was so wealthy. They'd sucked all his brain cells out and into the brown bottles he used to worship.

  No more beer. No more parties. And no matter what, no more women.

  Travis moaned and reached up, feeling along the counter for the Tylenol. He drew the bottle down to his level and flipped up the top with his thumb.

  Empty.

  Now that was poetic justice.

  Momma’s All-You-Need-Is-This Tuna Casserole

  12 ounces flat egg noodles, cooked and drained

  2 7-ounce cans tuna, drained

  1 cup mayonnaise

  1 large onion, chopped

  1 green pepper, chopped

  1 celery rib, chopped

  1 teaspoon salt

  Dash pepper

  2 10-ounce cans cream of celery soup

  1 cup milk

  2 cups Velveeta cheese

  1/2 cup Parmesan cheese

  1/2 cup French-fried onions

  Nothing's wrong with you that a good home-cooked meal can't fix, that's for sure. You don't need that fancy city food. The basics will do you fine and get you right back to where you belong—at home, in the loving arms of your family, living out your destiny.

  Start by preheating the oven to 375 degrees. Then mix the tuna, mayonnaise, onion, pepper, celery, salt and pepper in a bowl. No need to get pretty, just stir it all together.

  Meanwhile, heat the soup, milk and Velveeta in a saucepan over low heat. Don't scorch it now, who knows what kind of cancer comes from burned food? Once it's all melted, mix it with the ingredients in the bowl, stir in the Parmesan, then dump the whole thing into a 3-quart casserole dish (now you know your Momma gave you a Pyrex set for your hope chest. She's still hoping, so you better get it out of the chest). Sprinkle with the onions, then bake it for 30 minutes.

  That's plenty of time to think about a certain bad decision you made. And if you don't start doing some thinking quick, Momma's going to have to send out the cavalry to help you.

  Chapter Three

  An hour later, the Motorola won. Meredith finally answered the twentieth—or maybe it was the twenty-first—call, before her phone could explode like a bottle of nitroglycerine that had been aggravated one too many times.

  She'd barely had half a second to greet her cousin before her cell phone had started again. Meredith waved a quick apology to Rebecca, then slumped into an armchair and faced the consequences.

  "I hope you at least brought protection, dear," her mother said, not even waiting for a hello.

  Oh yeah, she'd brought protection. Not her mother's idea of it, though. In her purse was a thirty-six-pack box of Ultra Thin Lubricated Trojans. She doubted Walgreens would let her return them.

  Nor did she intend to.

  When she'd run away from Heavendale, Indiana, she'd done it without looking back. She had no intentions of returning home until she was different— very different.

  She might be here to help her cousin. But most of all, she was here to shed the small-town Meredith Shordon, who was as common as rain in the spring and weeds in the garden. The first place to start was with a man.

  "Meredith? Are you all right? I worry about you, dear."

  "Momma, I'm alive. I'm breathing. Stop worrying."

  "A girl can't be too careful, you know." In the background, Meredith could hear her father echoing agreement with a grunt. An Engelbert Humperdinc
k song played on the radio in her mother's sunflower wallpaper kitchen. "Especially in a city like that. You need all the help you can get."

  Meredith raised her eyes heavenward and prayed she wouldn't be struck down in the La-Z-Boy for lying. "I packed it."

  "Both economy-size containers of Purell I gave you?"

  The instant hand sanitizer lotion was sitting in the back of her apartment closet in Indiana, but Meredith didn't say that. Her mother and Sam's Club were a dangerous combination. "Yep."

  "And the Lysol?"

  "Of course."

  "Have you been ..." At this, her mother paused. From a thousand miles away, Meredith could picture Martha Shordon looking around for any listening ears. Little teapots, she called them, though neither Meredith nor her two older brothers had ever resembled beverage containers. Nor were any of them, now in their mid-to-late twenties, too young for whatever words her conservative, God-fearing mother might say. ".. . putting those paper covers on the toilet seats before you . .. well, you know. Number one, number two and all that."

  Now that was one thing Meredith had done. Who knew what kind of diseases lurked in public restrooms? "Yes, every time."

  Her mother let out a long breath of relief. "Good. I'm just concerned about you, dear. That's all. This isn't like you."

  For a moment, Meredith felt a twinge of regret for leaving like she had. For letting everyone down. She heard the concern in her mother's voice and knew that even though Momma was a germophobe to rival Mr. Clean, she handed out those Clorox Wipes with love.

  "I'm fine, Momma," Meredith repeated.

  "Have you stopped by to say hello to your Aunt Gloria yet?" Momma asked, referring to her sister, Rebecca's mother. "Maybe she can talk some sense into you. I just can't understand why you took off like a bat out of you-know-where."

  "I don't want to talk about that right now."

  Momma sighed. "Meredith, you can't just up and leave your responsibilities like that."

  "I just got to Rebecca's. I want to say hello and unpack and—"

  "Dear," her mother said, her voice lowering again, out of teapot range, "is her house clean?"

  Her mother's perennial question. To her, someone with a dirty house or untidy kitchen ranked in the same category as a potbellied pig with diarrhea. She didn't want either in her house, spreading what she called an air of disorder in her pristine environment

  Cleanliness was, of course, the best way to equate oneself with godliness. To her mother, those who couldn't find the time or energy to de-germ their homes weren't worth a broken cookie at the church bake sale.

  Meredith glanced around her. In her mother's eyes, Rebecca's disarray would be an offense against humanity, though Meredith didn't see anything potentially lethal in the room. Piles of preschooler toys grouped into colorful mini-mountains of leftover play around the room. A blanket lay haphazardly across the sofa, trailing onto the floor. And at her feet, a big, fat snoring beagle who smelled like mothballs.

  "Yep, clean as a whistle."

  "You make sure and watch how often she washes her hands and—"

  "I know, Momma. I have to go. I love you."

  Her mother let out a sound of discontent at having her hygiene lecture interrupted, then she softened. "I love you too, dear. Be safe. And remember, Indiana girls are good girls."

  Meredith ignored the flickers of doubt in her gut, said good-bye to her mother, then flipped the phone shut and stuffed it back into her purse. She was half tempted to turn it off, lest her mother call again, but had a sudden image of the cops surrounding Rebecca's house on good Shordon authority that only a hostage situation would prevent Meredith from answering.

  Meredith turned to Rebecca, who had ensconced herself in the opposite armchair. Rebecca's second pregnancy, now nearing the end at thirty-six weeks, was well pronounced, like the baby was determined to introduce himself or herself into every conversation. Rebecca wore her shoulder-length, straight brown hair back in a clip that she said kept it out of her eyes— and out of reach of the hairstylist-to-be fingers of her four-year-old daughter, Emily. Rebecca was a beautiful woman, one of the few in the family who hadn't been cursed with the Shordon mini-chest or the mega-nose.

  "Sorry," Meredith said. "When my mother calls—"

  "I know," Rebecca said, laughing. "It's like a primal urge to let our mothers keep having input in our lives, even when we're long past the legal drinking age."

  "It's masochistic.''

  Rebecca laughed. "At least your mother is a thousand miles away. Mine lives next door. One of these days, I swear Jeremy and I are going to have enough money to afford a house of our own."

  Rebecca lived in a small Cape-style house owned by her parents, Aunt Gloria and Uncle Mike, bought years before as rental property after Uncle Mike had transferred up to Massachusetts with a promotion from American Airlines. The houses sat a few streets down from the Charles River, close enough to catch the scent of the fresh water and a glimpse of the boaters.

  Their investment had paid for itself quickly in the desirable Cambridge area, so when Rebecca got married—and pregnant in quick succession—they'd rented the second house out to their only child.

  “I’m sure it won't be much longer before you've got a mortgage of your own to complain about,'' Meredith said with a smile.

  "If Jeremy ever decides he's got enough education it won't. Now he's signing up for his doctorate. At MIT, which will cost us a fortune." Rebecca reached for a basket of clean laundry and began folding the little pastel T-shirts and pants inside. "I swear, I'm going to go crazy living here."

  "It makes finding a babysitter easier, though."

  "I'd prefer a sitter who kept her opinions about my housekeeping to herself."

  Meredith laughed. "Sounds like those tendencies run in the family, at least between those two sisters." She thought of Aunt Gloria, whose house was as chaotic as Martha's was pristine. Despite being on opposing cleanliness spectrums, the two sisters shared one common trait—they were both darn good Buttinskis.

  Rebecca chuckled. "Want some wine? I'll live vicariously through you. I haven't had a glass in so long, I wonder if I'm fermenting. Being pregnant has put a serious kink in my social life."

  "At least you have one. My idea of Friday night fun is getting off early from Petey's Pizza Parlor and waiting for Hester to lay a new egg in Grandpa's chicken coop."

  "I remember how bad it was in Indiana when I was a kid. God, I don't miss that place at all."

  Rebecca started to get to her feet, but Meredith waved her back down. "You sit. I'll get it. You're on bedrest, remember?"

  "Ah, it is nice to be spoiled." A smile spread across her cousin's face. "Sure I can't talk you into moving in permanently?"

  "Hey, I'm easily bribed." Meredith crossed to the kitchen to get the wine. While her cousin rested on the couch and gave directions, Meredith opened a bottle of zinfandel for herself and poured Rebecca a glass of ice water. It was after ten and the house was silent, with Emily asleep and Jeremy off with his study group, boning up on engineering principles.

  "Labor pains okay?" Meredith asked from the kitchen.

  "Much better now that I can't do anything but sit around the house. I'll be glad when this baby comes and I can move again.

  "Speaking of painful stuff... How's Caleb?" Rebecca asked, when Meredith returned to the living room with the drinks. Her cousin patted an empty spot on the sofa beside her.

  Guilt pricked at her. There was another thing she'd abandoned—her former fiancé. Caleb hadn't taken the ending of their relationship well at all.

  Good thing he'd had that paper bag in the glove compartment of the hearse. That, and a trip to DQ for a soft-serve chocolate cone, had taken the edge off the words "It's over."

  "He's okay," Meredith said, taking the proffered seat. "Still thinking we'll get back together, though. But we won't. Besides, I think I'm allergic to the smell of formaldehyde. Every time I was with him, I felt ill."

  Rebecca laughed. "I'm
sure you'll meet someone different from Caleb, especially here. Not too many embalmers hang out in the local bars."

  "I want more than different. I want a guy who ... well, who knows what he's doing." Meredith arched a brow of hint. "With everything."

  Rebecca looked at Meredith. She blinked twice. "That is totally not you. At least not the Meredith I remember from the summers at Grandpa's lake cottage."

  "I know. It's the most insane thing I've ever wanted to do in my life."

  Rebecca gestured at her with the water glass, the ice cubes clinking like quiet music. "Why didn't you do all this wild oat sowing back in Indiana?"

  "You lived there when you were a kid. You remember what it was like. Everyone knows everyone in Heavendale. If I bought two percent instead of whole milk, the neighbors would tell my mother before I could get home." She shook her head. "Can you imagine what doing something like this would generate?"

  Rebecca laughed. "A gossip tornado."

  "Exactly." That was something Meredith couldn't afford, not back home. Everything that happened in Boston had to stay in Boston. If word leaked back to the Heavendale papers, she'd ruin much more than just her own reputation.

  And that was a price she couldn't afford to pay.

  A smile crossed Rebecca's lips. She moved forward and drew her cousin into a hug. "I hope you know what you're doing."

  "I do," Meredith said. "Sort of."

  "You're playing with lit matches."

  "That's what I'm hoping."

  Rebecca drew back and gave a simple shrug that said she was going to support her cousin, no matter what. "Well, if you're sure you want to toy with fire, I can tell you exactly where to go to find some really cute kindling."

  Kenny's Everything's-Better-With-a-Beer Fish

  1 pound fish (haddock, cod, whatever you want)

  1/2 cup flour

  1/2 teaspoon salt

  Pepper

  1 bottle beer (definitely stale—don't waste a perfectly good beer on this!)