Heartstrings and Diamond Rings

by Jane Graves

  “So you actually intend to go months without getting laid? That would be a first.”

  Brandon didn’t much like the thought of that, either, but he wasn’t going to allow anything to get in the way of getting the money he needed. It was the only shot he had right now, so even if he had to maintain the sexual habits of a priest, he wasn’t about to let it go.

  When Brandon told Alison about David and then sent his information to her, she felt that tiny stirring of hope she always did whenever a new man was on the horizon. Still, she tried her best not to get her hopes up. Brandon had yet to prove himself, so this date could turn out even worse than the last one.

  The next Friday night, she met David at the restaurant he’d suggested, which turned out to be one of those see-and-be-seen places she generally hated. Everyone was crammed butt‑to‑butt in the bar, swaying to the music and spilling martinis down each other’s backs but looking fabulous while they were doing it. Alison only had so much fabulousness in her, and she wasn’t sure this was a place where she wanted to waste any of it.

  David himself, though, seemed as good as he’d sounded on paper. Dark hair, dark eyes, nice build, nicely dressed. He was thirty-eight, but if not for the touch of gray at his temples, she would have thought he wasn’t much older than she was. When he turned and saw her for the first time, he smiled in a way that didn’t seem phony, though some guys were really good at faking that first impression. She herself had mastered it. Fortunately, this time she could let her face relax into a genuine reflection of the way she felt, which was So far, so good.

  The hostess escorted them to a table away from the bar where it was quieter, which was nice, even though they were still within sight of the beautiful people. David picked up the wine list. “How about a bottle of wine?”

  “That’d be good,” she said. Actually, great. First date nervousness sucked, and a little alcohol always made her brain settle down. A few minutes later they were sipping cabernet, and Alison began to relax.

  “So you’re an electrical engineer,” she said. “That’s interesting.”

  “Usually, yeah. But right now I’m stuck working on an optical emission spectrometer for metal analysis.” He rolled his eyes. “Boring.”

  She nodded with sympathy, even though she didn’t have a clue what he was talking about.

  “And you’re in marketing?” he asked.

  “Yeah. I work for Spangler Sweets. I’m basically a candy pusher. Our products are as addictive as meth, but we don’t get thrown in jail for selling them.”

  It was her go-to opening line about her job that she used to determine if a guy had any sense of humor at all. A smile was all she was looking for. David actually laughed, which meant she could relax a little more.

  The waitress brought their appetizer—chicken satay with a sweet cucumber sauce. But just as Alison was getting ready to dig in, David sat up straight, his eyes going wide as he looked at something over her right shoulder. She turned to look. No celebrity had walked in. Nothing was on fire. So what was he staring at?

  “Is something wrong?” she asked.

  He turned his eyes back to Alison, looking a little flustered. “No. Nothing’s wrong. Nothing at all.”

  Then his gaze shifted back to the something that was nothing. Alison looked over her shoulder again. Three women had just sat down at a table in the bar.

  “Are you looking at those women?” she asked.

  “Nope. Don’t see anybody. Doesn’t the chicken satay look good?”

  “Yeah,” Alison said warily, because David’s eyes kept shifting from the good‑looking chicken to the women at the bar and back again.

  “Are you sure you don’t know those women?” she asked.

  “Okay,” he admitted. “I do. One of them is my ex-wife, Janet.”

  Alison’s heart seized up. Well, crap. An ex-wife showing up was never good. Never.

  Never.

  “But don’t worry,” David said, putting an appetizer on his plate. “I have no feelings for her anymore. None at all.”

  “Are you sure about that?”

  “Absolutely. I just know she’s talking about me. That’s all.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “That woman to her left is Stacy Rankowsky. She’s the reason we broke up in the first place. Filled my wife’s head with all kinds of crap about how I was controlling and manipulative. She once called me a Neanderthal. Me! I’m telling you, Alison, I’m the most easygoing guy you’ll ever meet.” He took a bite of the chicken satay. “Oh. This is so good. You have to try it.”

  Alison picked up one of the appetizers and dipped it into the sauce. One bite told her he was right. These were heaven on a wooden skewer.

  “So tell me, Alison. Have you lived in Plano long?”

  “I grew up in Dallas and then moved here after college. I have a condo near the rail line, which is nice because—”

  And then he was looking over her shoulder again.

  “What’s wrong?” Alison asked.

  “This is no accident,” he said, frowning. “She must have found out I was going to be here.”

  “How would she have found out?”

  “My friend Derek must have told her.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  “She probably wheedled it out of him.”

  “Uh…she’s your ex. Why would she care?”

  “You sure ask a lot of questions, Alison. Wouldn’t you rather concentrate on what’s going on between us?”

  Well, yeah. Except she wasn’t the one who had digressed in the first place.

  For the next ten minutes, David made what looked like a concerted effort to put all his attention on Alison, but even when he wasn’t looking at Janet, he was tapping his fingertips on the table as if he was nervous or pissed or both, his jaw looking as if it was set in granite. But that was only during the times when he wasn’t smiling insincerely at Alison and swearing his ex meant nothing to him.

  “Don’t take this wrong, David,” she said as he glanced over her shoulder for the sixty‑fourth time. “But I think it’s possible you still have feelings for Janet.”

  “Feelings? For her? No.” He made a scoffing noise. “Not just no, but hell no.” He smiled at Alison. “You’re the one I’m interested in right now. Now, where were we?”

  “We were talking about our jobs,” Alison said. “I was telling you about this boss I used to have who—”

  “Now they’re laughing,” David said. “Stacy looked over here, and then she said something to the rest of them, and they’re laughing. And Janet is laughing more than the other two put together.”

  “But you’re over her, remember? So does it really matter?”

  He laughed nervously. “No. Of course not. Old habits, huh? So…tell me about your boss. I could tell that was going to be an interesting story.”

  He put his elbow on the table and rested his chin in his hand, giving her his undivided attention. So Alison launched into the story, which was another one of her staples on a first date because it really was funny and most guys laughed. But as she got to the most amusing part of all, she saw David’s gaze drift over to the table full of women. He jerked it back, but then it drifted again.

  “David? Would you like to meet up another night? You know—sometime when your ex‑wife isn’t sitting across the room?”

  “Of course not! I told you. Past history. Water under the bridge.”

  “I’m not so sure about that.”

  “Well, I am.”

  “How long has your divorce been final?”

  “Five weeks.”

  Alison nearly choked. “Five weeks? And already you want to date other women?”

  “Yes,” he said, frowning. “Like I said, I am so over her. So why waste another minute of life? And life was hell with Janet, let me tell you. One time I stayed out all night drinking with my buddies, and when I got home, do you know what she’d done? She’d piled my Playboy collection on the patio and set fire to
it!”

  Stayed out all night? Playboy collection? Maybe she was on Janet’s side on this one. “What nerve. Gee, maybe you were right to divorce her.”

  “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you! Divorce is too good for her!” He took a heavy gulp of wine. “I got her back, though,” he said, revenge lighting his eyes. “I flushed her tropical fish down the toilet.”

  Okay. This was getting weird. Particularly since the fish flusher still couldn’t seem to keep his eyes off the pyromaniac.

  “Look at that,” he said, coming to attention. “They’re laughing again.”

  “I’m sure somebody just told a joke, or something.”

  “It’s time I gave her a piece of my mind.” He pushed his chair away from the table.

  “Uh…David? I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Why not?”

  Should she really have to explain why not? Really?

  “Because you’re on a date with me, but you’re fixating on your ex-wife. Sorry, but that’s a little weird.”

  “How many times do I have to tell you? I’m over her.” He rose from his chair. “I’ll be back in a minute. Then we’ll go back to having a nice date. Okay?”

  She had news for him. That ship had sailed.

  He strode toward Janet’s table, only now Janet was getting up, looking really pissed, and walking away from him. She strode toward the front of the restaurant and disappeared around a corner with David storming after her.

  Alison was stunned. World War III was on the horizon. Thank God they were taking it outside.

  She sat there for a moment or two more, wondering what to do. No, wait. There was no wondering here. It was time to go, preferably before David returned and this charade began all over again. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she was regretting that one more date hadn’t worked out, but she was so fixated on putting as much distance between her and the fish flusher that, at least for now, she just didn’t care.

  She grabbed her purse and headed for the front door of the restaurant, stopping off at the ladies’ room before the long drive home. She went inside, turned the corner from the dressing area to the bathroom stalls, and heard voices.

  “I hate you,” a man’s breathy voice said, “You know I hate you.”

  “I hate you, too,” a woman’s voice said. “Why do you think I divorced you?”

  “You didn’t divorce me. I divorced you!”

  “It takes two to split, you bastard!”

  David? And his lovely ex-wife, Janet? Cussing each other out in a bathroom stall?

  But then there was more heavy breathing. A grunt or two. A little moan here and there.

  What the hell?

  “But you know I can’t live without you,” Janet said. “I hate you, but I can’t live without—oh, God, yes. Yes! Like that!”

  Alison looked under the door to see only one set of feet. Male feet. So what had happened to Janet’s feet? Alison tried to visualize the exact configuration of body parts, but that particular X-rated puzzle was still in pieces.

  “You like that? Of course you do. You’re a bad girl. You’ve always been such a bad girl. You like it dirty, don’t you?”

  “Yes. Dirty.” Gasp. “Make it dirty.”

  And it didn’t get much dirtier than doing it in a bathroom stall.

  “I saw you with that woman,” Janet said. “Do you want her, David? Do you? Or do you want me?”

  “You. I’ve always wanted you.” Gasp, gasp, gasp. “Even when I hate you, I want you. Christ, it’s a curse!”

  “Yes, David. Do it to me. Do it hard. Oh, God, that’s good…so good…so…aaaghhh…”

  More gasps. More groans. More screams.

  Just then the ladies’ room door opened and a woman walked in. As if it were just any old day in a restaurant bathroom, she walked toward the stall next to where the action was. Just then, Janet let out an orgasmic moan that rattled the walls, mingling with David’s grunts of satisfaction.

  The woman leaned away quizzically, her brow scrunching up. She turned to Alison. “Is there a man in there?”

  Alison leaned over and spoke in a confidential whisper. “Yes. I think she’s sick and he’s helping her.”

  “Yeah? Sounds to me like she’s horny and he’s screwing her.” Then she proceeded into the adjacent stall and closed the door behind her.

  Okay. That woman might be able to pee with a live sex show going on next door, but that was a line Alison just couldn’t cross. Instead, she left the restaurant, drove down the street, and used the bathroom at a McDonald’s. Then she washed her hands, looked in the mirror, and wondered: This is a first date. How did I end up here?

  She got in her car to drive to Brandon’s house, where he was going to give her an answer to that question, or else.

  Chapter 12

  Brandon had just about fallen asleep in front of the TV when he heard somebody banging on his front door. Tom got up and looked out the peephole. “Uh-oh.”

  Brandon came to attention. “What?”

  “It’s Alison.”

  Brandon grabbed his phone and looked at the time. Crap. Too early. She clearly wasn’t dropping by to tell him what a screaming success her date with David had been. He jumped out of his chair and went to the door.

  “Go back to the den,” he told Tom.

  “You sure? If she starts swinging that purse, you might need some backup.”

  “Will you just go?”

  As Tom left the room, Brandon opened the door to find Alison standing on the porch, her arms folded and her mouth set in a grim, angry line.

  “We need to talk,” she snapped.

  “Uh…okay.”

  “Is Tom home?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then come out here. I don’t need to hear anything more about whale noises.”

  She turned around and sat down on the porch swing, her arms folded, glaring at him. The night was hot, and cicadas were screeching madly in the trees. Brandon had a feeling that in a moment Alison was going to be doing some screeching of her own. He closed the door and walked over to sit down beside her, bracing himself for the onslaught.

  “I assume this is about your date with David,” he said.

  “You think?”

  “Okay. Tell me what happened.”

  “Well, let’s see. David had sex on our first date. It just wasn’t with me.”

  “What?”

  “He saw his ex-wife at the restaurant. He followed her into the ladies’ room. Turns out it’s not just something they made up for porn movies. You really can do it in a bathroom stall.”

  Brandon sat back in disbelief. “He did his ex-wife in a bathroom stall while he was on a date with you?”

  “Wow,” she said with a touch of sarcasm. “Sounds even worse when you say it.”

  “He told me he hated women like her. That she was cheap and slutty and she cheated on him.”

  “Which quite obviously turns him on.”

  “He told me he was over her.”

  “He told me he was over her, too. About sixty-seven times. Then he met her in stall number two. Judging from the pillow talk, he hates her but he can’t live without her. It appears the feeling is mutual.”

  “So you listened to the whole thing?”

  “At first I was in denial. Then I was in shock. Then I had to pee, but I sure as hell wasn’t going to do it there, so I went to a McDonald’s. What a way to end an evening.”

  Brandon started to tell her that sarcasm really didn’t suit her, only to realize that right about then, it kinda did.

  “Maybe he was trying to prove to himself that he was over her,” Brandon said.

  “Well, if that’s the case, he blew it big time, didn’t he?”

  Okay. He was in trouble now. It wasn’t going to take three strikes. Alison was going to call him out at two. He tried to think of any excuse for his failure that he could possibly think of, but he couldn’t come up with a damned thing.

  “I’m sorry, A
lison,” he said, shaking his head. “I checked out that guy from top to bottom. His questionnaire was great. Didn’t have so much as a parking ticket. He sounded like the perfect match for you.”

  “The guy has been divorced only five weeks,” Alison said. “You didn’t think that was a big red flag?”

  Brandon drew back. “Five weeks? That’s all?”

  “So he didn’t tell you?”

  “God, no, or I never would have set you up with him!”

  “Don’t you think that would have been a really smart question to ask?”

  Yes. It would have. So why hadn’t he thought of it?

  “Do you know this is a man who flushed his wife’s tropical fish down the toilet?”

  “What?”

  “But only in retaliation for her piling up his Playboy magazines and burning them.”

  Brandon shook his head in disbelief. This didn’t sound like the guy he’d talked to at McCaffrey’s the other day. That guy had seemed reasonable and levelheaded, even if he was down on his ex-wife. After all, she’d cheated on him, hadn’t she? It was reasonable to Brandon that he’d be at least a little bitter. But the guy Alison was describing was just this side of pathologic.

  “I guess it’s a love-hate thing,” she said. “Can’t live with her, can’t live without her. But at least they have a little passion going. That’s more than I can say.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Do you know that the weirdest place I’ve ever done it was in a bed? What does that say about me?”

  “You like to be comfortable?”

  “Nope. I lead a really boring life.”

  “So you want me to set you up with a guy who drags you into a bathroom stall and has sex with you?”

  Alison thought about that. “No. I don’t think I can have both. If I want a family man, I have to settle for a little bit of ordinary. If I want passion, I’ll end up with a guy who runs back to his ex-wife at the drop of a hat. But that’s what love is all about. Modest expectations. That way you can’t be disappointed.”

  “That’s bullshit.”

  She whipped around. “What?”

  “Don’t settle for a life like that.”

  “An ordinary life? What’s wrong with that?”