Hubert sighed. “He’s just so slick. The whole time I was talking to him all I could wonder was, what’s his game? You hardly know him. Take it from me—you can think you know a person, and it can turn out that they have a whole other side you know nothing about. I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
He was comparing Ryan to Kelly? Please. “You only talked to him for a few minutes,” I pointed out, “so I hardly think you can cast judgments. Trust me, he has no ‘game’—we’re just two people dating.”
“It’s not just me saying it.” He rested his chin on his fist. “The whole neighborhood talks about him.”
“I know, I’ve heard. He never puts out garbage, and he’s gone a lot, and he has a lot of packages delivered. None of which is a crime, by the way.” I looked at my watch. I only had an hour before Ryan and I were leaving for the restaurant.
“Belinda said she looked up his property tax records and they were paid late three years in a row. Not only that, but—”
“I think Belinda should mind her own business,” I said, standing up abruptly. “If you’ll excuse me, Hubert, I have to get dressed for dinner at the Palmer House.”
I went upstairs and got ready for my date, starting from bare skin and working outward. I lathered up and rinsed off in the shower, washing away the sand still encrusted between my toes. I loofahed my elbows and knees, something I knew to be part of Piper’s routine but which I never saw the need for prior to this. I reapplied makeup and dried my hair using my round brush, and then I slipped on a deep red halter dress I’d only worn once before, for a wedding. My uncle compared it to the one Marilyn Monroe wore standing over the air vent, and he was close even if the color was different and I was no Marilyn Monroe. Still, it was a great dress—silk, or at least silk-like. It required dry-cleaning, so each use was a seven-dollar investment. The neckline plunged pretty low for me. Luckily, the dress had built-in cups. I wore a gold necklace to take the focus off my breasts and put on the matching bolero jacket, which toned down the look from slutty to sexy.
The ensemble came with a clutch purse, a concept I despised. A regular purse with a strap could be slung over a shoulder or held loosely, but a clutch purse had to be clutched, an abnormal position that turned a woman’s hand into a claw. Still, the purse matched, so what could I do? I loaded it with my wallet, phone, sunglasses, and lip gloss and then snapped it shut. Men were lucky—they could get by with pockets.
When the time came to leave, I slipped out the back door and yelled, “Bye, Hubert,” as I left. I loved Hubert, really I did, but I wasn’t up to hearing more penny-ante bad news about Ryan before my date. I was a big girl and a pretty good judge of character. I appreciated his concern, but he’d have to trust me on this.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
The Palmer House gave Ryan the stamp of approval. Everyone recognized him, from the two young men who did valet parking, to the bartender, to the maître d’. A group of businessmen stopped their conversation to greet Ryan as we were led to our table. (“The corner, just as you requested, Mr. Moriarty.”) I felt like I was out with George Clooney. After we sat down, I asked, “How do they all know you?”
“I bring clients here quite often,” he said. “And my parents know the owners. We’ve been coming here for years. You know how that is.”
I looked around the elegant dining room with its beautiful chandelier made up of millions of prisms, the thick drapes held back with gold cord, the oil paintings each highlighted with their own little stage light. My family also had a restaurant we’d frequented for years. It was a pizza joint called Barnaby’s that featured a little jukebox at each booth. As kids, Mindy and I couldn’t wait to finish our meal because then we could pick a prize out of the treasure chest. I always looked for the plastic decayed teeth, while Mindy generally picked toy tiaras or rings.
I let Ryan choose the wine, and after he ordered coq au vin and a spinach salad, I told the waiter I’d have the same. Since he picked the wine to go with the chicken, it seemed a safe choice.
The meal went seamlessly, from wine to bread to salad to the main course. Ryan did most of the talking, telling me about some of his most recent trips and a few minor airport snafus—delayed flights, missed connections. I nodded and drank throughout. At one point, I realized my mind was drifting. Pleasantly drifting. I emptied my glass, and before I could even set it down, our waiter was there to refill it. We never got that kind of service at Barnaby’s.
The alcohol was really kicking in now. I felt a surge of affection for everyone in the room, from the dark-haired young man who cleared our salad plates, to the two old ladies at the next table, both of whom looked like the Queen Mother. “Tell me again what you do exactly for your work,” I said during a pause.
“Quality control, mostly. I also help companies implement management systems.”
“Management systems?”
“Six Sigma, Lean, that type of thing.”
“And you like your job?” In my slightly drunken state it seemed important to pin down exactly who this man was.
“I like it well enough,” he said, putting his hand over mine. “It pays the bills.”
The bills. I thought of his property tax. Late three years in a row. If it weren’t for that damn nosy Belinda poking her nose in Ryan’s business, I wouldn’t even know that little bit of trivia. Big deal, so his taxes were a little late. It happens. He paid them eventually. Maybe Ryan was just one of those people who has trouble keeping track of paperwork. An easy explanation. But there was one more thing on my mind. “Did you say you bought your car six months ago?”
“No, I said I got my car six months ago.” He took a sip of wine. “It’s leased. I find that leasing has tax advantages for me.”
Now I was confused. I thought for sure he said he bought it. I remembered him saying he had the Jag ordered. Something about it being customized. My thinking on the subject was fuzzy, and I was having trouble remembering why I’d doubted him in the first place. Or why it even mattered.
“Did I tell you how stunning you look in that dress?” Ryan ran a finger over the sleeve of the jacket. “That’s a great color on you. Beautiful.”
And suddenly I felt beautiful. I was in a la-di-da restaurant, being pampered and spoiled by the attentive staff. Money was no object this evening. I was with Ryan, a drop-dead gorgeous guy and Palmer House celebrity. We were eating delicious food that had been painstakingly prepared and served on beautiful china. The wine was delicious, light and medium dry. It went down as smoothly as spring rain in a valley.
By the time our dinner plates were cleared, I decided I could have this exact evening played over and over in one continuous loop into eternity, me in my gorgeous red dress across from this beautiful man.
Our wine glasses were full again, and Ryan proposed a toast. “To new beginnings,” he said. I held my glass up but didn’t try to clink. I had a feeling that was a beer hall move. “Lola,” he said, stretching my name beyond the boundaries of its two syllables. “Remember our plan to announce our faux engagement at your sister’s wedding?”
“Of course.” Man, this wine was good. Was this new bottle different than the previous one?
“If you don’t have any objections, I’d like to propose to you tonight. Everyone always asks about the proposal, and I think it would make a great story.”
I set down my glass, unsure, while he got up out of his chair and knelt on one knee in front of me. The tables around us hushed with the realization of what was happening. Looking down at him, I noticed for the first time that the carpet had a subtle fleur-de-lis pattern. “Lola,” he said, enunciating clearly, “I love you and want to spend my life with you. Will you marry me?” Like a magician, he pulled a box seemingly out of nowhere and flipped it open to reveal a breathtakingly beautiful diamond ring.
“Wow,” I said. I realized that was not the right answer when Ryan said, a little more loudly this time, “Will you marry me, Lola?”
“Yes, Ryan,” I said, “I wi
ll marry you.” The other diners applauded loudly, and I heard a few sentimental murmurs. I got an impression of confetti filling the air, flashbulbs going off, and a violinist playing in the distance, but that may have been the wine. I know for certain that a romantic kiss followed, and then Ryan slid the ring onto my finger. It was loose.
“Look,” he said, “it’s a perfect fit. I think that’s a good sign.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
It was official. I was drunk.
Not falling down drunk, thank goodness, but definitely a little more than tipsy. When the valet brought the car around and Ryan opened the door for me, I had to think hard about the best way to get in. It was dark and the opening looked smaller than before. I managed, somehow, remembering at the last minute the general rule that legs go last.
As Ryan shifted into drive, he said, “That went well, don’t you think?”
“Very well.” I held my hand out to admire the ring. Ryan had said the center stone was three carats, and the diamonds on either side were a carat each.
“I think my performance was rather convincing.”
“Yes, very convincing.” I moved my hand, trying to get the diamonds to catch the light from the dashboard.
“Be careful with that,” he said, glancing over. “It’s on loan from the jeweler.”
“A jeweler let you borrow this?” How did that work?
He nodded. “I said I’d need it for a few weeks.”
I wasn’t sure why I felt disappointed. After all, I knew this was a con. Still, there was a small part of me that would have loved to keep the ring. “And they were OK with you taking it? How? I mean, why would they let you do that?”
“They were under the distinct impression,” he said, grinning devilishly, “that I might possibly be buying it.”
“So what will you say when you return it?”
“I will say that the love of my life turned me down.” He wiped away a pretend tear. “And when they see what a heartbroken, pathetic shell of a man I’ve become, they’ll gift me with some cheap cufflinks so I won’t have to walk away empty-handed. A consolation prize to ensure I don’t associate the jeweler with rejection.”
It sounded like he had experience in this area. I tilted my hand and looked at the ring from every angle. I could see now why newly engaged women kept their nails beautifully manicured.
He said, “I looked at dozens of rings before selecting this one. I know some might consider five carats a little ostentatious, but I thought for our purposes it worked. We want to make a splash.” He sounded pleased with himself.
“This will definitely make a splash.” A temporary splash. At least he’d end up with cufflinks, unlike, say, me, who would have only the memory of once having gotten a ring.
When we turned onto the interstate, Ryan put in a new CD, one of the Marsalis brothers. I forgot which one immediately after hearing the name. The music was nice though. In my inebriated state, it played like the soundtrack of a movie in which a movie-star handsome man drove his pretend fiancée home after having just made a fake marriage proposal to her at a restaurant. We were enactors, I realized sadly—like Civil War reenactors. No matter how convincingly the soldiers were dressed, with their authentic costumes and mutton chop whiskers, spectators always knew it was pretend. No one ever ran for cover during the fake battles. No one ever called 911 to help the injured. They looked like soldiers, and they acted like soldiers, but it didn’t ring true.
Because it wasn’t real.
And my relatives would know too, I realized, that Ryan and I weren’t real. We could stand in front of all the guests at Mindy and Chad’s wedding—Ryan looking dashing, and me a dressed-up version of the Lola they’d known forever—and even with this ring on my finger, the picture wouldn’t fit. We’d look like two people who’d just started dating, a couple who didn’t even know each other’s middle names or toothpaste preference. Frauds. It would be so sad and humiliating not to be able to pull it off. If only there was a way to make it convincing.
If only.
“Ryan,” I said, “I’ve been thinking about the conversation we had on your porch the other day. Do you remember?”
“Sure.” He reached over and turned the radio down.
“When we were talking about Mindy’s wedding, and you said people can tell if a couple has had sex or not.”
“I remember.”
“Do you really think that’s true?”
“Yes, I do.” Ryan exited onto the main thoroughfare that led back to our neighborhood. “Why do you ask?” He sneaked a glance in my direction.
“It’s just,” I said, “that I think I’ve come around to your way of thinking.”
“I see.” And then he said nothing for the longest time. The longest time. The jazz CD played to the end of the song, and then there was a silence before a new song began. His face was completely impassive, impossible to read. I looked out the window and watched the streetlights whiz past and reflected that I’d reached a new low. I’d just offered to have sex with a man and gotten no reaction at all.
We turned onto King Street, and I heard him humming along with the music. I turned my head to see his lips curled in a smile. “Here we are,” he said, pulling into his driveway and pushing the button to open his garage door. When the car came to a stop, he shifted into park, turned off the engine, leaned over, and said, “I guess I don’t have to ask if you’d like to come in.” The garage door closed behind us.
“No, you don’t have to ask.” Relief flooded over me. I wasn’t a complete reject after all. I reached over to open the door, but Ryan told me to wait. He wanted to do the gentlemanly thing, which was good because that consisted of helping me out of the car and across to the side door.
There was a short path between the garage and the house, partially shielded by shrubs. When we stood on the threshold looking toward the house, Ryan whispered, “This is where it gets tricky.” He slid his arm around my lower back. “We have to be very quiet because if any of the neighbors are walking by, they’ll want to stop and chat and we’ll be stuck out here forever.”
“I hate that,” I said.
“Me too. That one with the dogs is the worst.”
Ah, Belinda. He didn’t know the half of it.
Inside the house he led me through the dark to the living room. In the dimness I could see the faint outline of a couch and chair on one wall, with the television set in the corner. A pretty sparse setup, not even a coffee table or ottoman. The only light in the room came through the slats of the blinds on the window opposite the couch.
“Come here, you,” Ryan said, pulling me up against him. He put his lips on mine and kissed me hard.
I slipped off my bolero jacket and let it drop to the floor. Ryan’s face showed approval. “You’ve been holding out on me,” he said. “Wow, you look hot in that dress. I can’t wait to see you out of it.”
Yes, it was an old line, but it was the first time anyone had ever said it to me.
I slid my arms around his neck, still aware of the ring on my finger. We melted together, kissing so heatedly it was hard for me to tell where my mouth ended and his began. Like it was choreographed, we stopped to kick off shoes. He peeled off his socks. I started to unbutton his shirt, but my fingers fumbled and I couldn’t manage it. He took over, and his shirt fell to the floor.
My eyes had adjusted to the lack of light. I ran my hands over his broad chest and felt like I was watching someone else. Lola Watson would never do anything this impulsive. My heart pounded, and my body experienced sensory overload.
“Shouldn’t we go to the bedroom?” I asked.
“No, it’s better here. My bedroom’s a mess.” His breathing was heavy in my ear. I thought of one of my former roommate’s favorite expressions—“hot and bothered”—and like verbs in French class, I came up with all the conjugations: he was hot and bothered, she was hot and bothered, I was hot and bothered.
He unsnapped the back of my halter dress, and the front fell
to my waist. He reached down and tugged impatiently at the waist, but it wasn’t going anywhere.
“There’s a zipper,” I said, reaching back.
But before I could get it, he said, “Oh, the hell with it,” and maneuvered me back onto the couch. Once I was down, he lowered his pants. The answer to the age-old question was…briefs. Not tighty whities, thankfully, something darker. His pants and briefs joined the shirt on the floor.
Now he was completely naked on top of me. I was partially unclothed, but all I could think about was the way my dress was bunched up around my middle, making me feel bulky. Like I needed that.
He ran his hand up my thigh-high stocking and between my legs. “Someone has too much clothing on,” he whispered in my ear.
You think? I shifted beneath him. “Maybe if I could—” But before I could finish my sentence, he moaned gently.
“What do you think of this?” he asked, taking my hand and guiding it to him. I lifted my head to see my hand up against what could only be described as a Dodger dog. He smiled. “See what you do to me?”
I had a moment of clarity when I wondered if there was a condom in the vicinity, but glancing around the room, I doubted it. The man didn’t even have coasters—how prepared could he be?
He positioned my hand like I was going to shift into a higher gear, but who knew who’d driven this thing before? “Maybe we should be taking precautions?” I said.
“You aren’t on the pill?”
I shook my head.
“Don’t worry, I know how to handle it. Just keep doing what you’re doing.”
In fact, I wasn’t doing much of anything. Just lying flat on my back, shell-shocked, wondering what I’d gotten myself into. I’d always envied the spontaneous, the free-spirited, but now I was second-guessing the whole situation.
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