by JF Freedman
She gave Sophia a hug, which Sophia reluctantly endured. “Don’t worry about hurting his feelings,” she said, the protective mother hen again, “If he had done the right thing in the first place, it wouldn’t be an issue. He’s the one who has the moral problem, not you.”
Sophia nodded. “I know, Mom. But still, I promised.” She put on a brave smile. “I’ll be okay with it. But don’t come tomorrow night.”
“I said I wouldn’t, and I won’t,” Kate promised her. “Now go and enjoy your party. We’ll have a celebration breakfast instead.”
“I have a riding lesson with Juanita tomorrow. I’ll be out of the house really early.”
“I forgot.” In truth, she hadn’t forgotten—she didn’t know about it. Sophia made her own schedule with Juanita now. “Give her my regards. Invite her to Sunday, too.”
Sophia beamed. The better she knew Juanita, the more she liked her. It was like she had inherited a grandmother. She would love for Juanita to see her in the play, and she knew Juanita would love to see her in it.
“I’ll do that,” she promised.
The stable was dark and cool. It was a relief to be in here, after having been outside in the sun. It was late in autumn now, so the heat wasn’t as bad as it had been in the months before, but it still got hot out here in the valley, even in the morning, when they customarily went riding.
Juanita was in the house, making their lunch. She had been thrilled at the invitation to come to the play. She hadn’t been to a proper social function in Santa Barbara for over a year. Even though it was only a high school production on a Sunday afternoon, she was going to dress up fancy. Sophia deserved that respect, she’d declared, to Sophia’s professed mortification. Although inwardly, she was pleased that Juanita took her seriously.
Sophia brushed and watered the horses and replenished their feed bags. Then she checked to see that the tack was wrapped and hung on the proper hooks. Satisfied that everything was in order, she sat on a low wooden bench and pulled off her riding boots, which she kept here. This was the only place she wore them. If she left them here, there was no chance she’d leave them home, by accident.
“Hello.” The voice came from out of the gloom at the back of the stable.
Sophia jumped. She looked behind her. Steven McCoy was standing at the other end. She couldn’t see his face because he was in shadow, but she knew he was staring at her. How long had he been there, she wondered? How long had he been watching her? Spying on her.
“Hello,” she said back, keeping her voice as neutral as possible. She was still in her socks. She hadn’t put her running shoes back on yet.
He walked toward her, emerging into the soft diffused light that leaked through the stable’s weather-stressed wooden walls. He was wearing a T-shirt, jeans, and work boots, not cowboy boots. His clothes were stained with grease, dirt, and sweat. He had taken his hat off, and his wet hair was plastered to his head. It was the sexiest look on a man she had ever seen in her life.
“How was your ride?” he asked. His voice was low and easy. There was no menace to it. He stood near her, a disarming smile on his face. Nothing about the way he presented himself was frightening, yet she felt her nerve endings coming on fire.
“Good.” Her lips were dry. She licked them. “It was good.”
“My grandmother says you’re a good rider.” He smiled again, a king of the world smile. “She says you’re a natural.”
“I’m all right,” she demurred. “I’ve got a lot to learn.”
“You’re learning from the master. Can you call a woman a master?” he teased her.
“I guess.” Her heart rate was starting to go down. He was just a man. Just a beautiful man. He wasn’t going to do anything to her, not with Juanita nearby.
He looked down at her feet. “You shouldn’t walk around in your socks in here,” he advised her. “There’s loose nails lying around, from horseshoes and stuff.”
“I was about to put my shoes on.” She pointed to her New Balance running shoes that were next to the boots.
He looked at her some more, but didn’t say anything. Disconcerted, she sat back down and pulled the running shoes on and laced them up. She stood up again.
“I’m going inside,” she told him. “Juanita’s making lunch for us.” She hesitated for a moment. “Are you going to join us?”
He shook his head. “I’m not supposed to be around you. I could get into trouble if they found out I was in here with you, alone.”
“They?”
“The detectives who check up on me. I have to report in every day. Sometimes they come out here unannounced, to see if I’m doing what I tell them I’m doing.”
“What do you tell them you’re doing?” she asked him.
“Keeping my nose clean.”
She smiled at him. “It’s dirty now. You must have wiped it with your greasy hand.” She picked up a towel she had used to dry herself off with after her ride. “I’ll get it for you.”
Brazenly, she reached up and wiped the grease off his face. They were close to each other now, inches apart. He gently took her wrist in his hand, as one would hold a captured wild bird.
His mouth was hot on hers. He hadn’t shaved—she could feel the rough texture of his beard scraping her cheek. He ground his pelvis against her, between her blue-jeaned legs, and she pushed back equally hard. Their hands were on the backs of each other’s heads, pulling them closer, mashing their mouths even more tightly together. His tongue was long and hot, like a snake diving into a hole. She felt like biting it, but she restrained herself.
He broke the kiss. They rocked apart, staring into each other’s eyes.
“I can’t be here,” he said. He was breathing as hard as she was. “It’s too close to the house. My grandmother will go ballistic if she finds me in here with you.”
She nodded. She didn’t want him to go. She wanted to kiss him again, and so much more.
“I’ll see you the next time you come out,” he said. He smiled. “When no one’s around to spy on us.”
He looked at her a moment longer, then he turned and walked to the rear of the stable and out the same back door that he’d come in earlier.
She wiped her hand across her mouth. She could feel the stubble burn on her cheek and chin. It would get red later, she’d have to put extra makeup on to cover it.
The next time they were together, she would have sex with him. There was no doubt in her mind. She had been waiting for this for a long time, and now the time had come.
Tina’s eyes looked like soup dishes in her face, they were so wide and unblinking. She stared at Jeremy, who was hovering at Sophia’s side in the center of a knot of kids. They were outside, near the stage door. The performance was over. It had been excellent; not as fabulous as last night’s, but still very good.
“We’ll do better tomorrow afternoon,” Sophia was saying to the boy who played the Scarecrow. “Tonight was like the lull before the storm.”
“I wish I had seen last night’s,” Jeremy whined. He could sense that Sophia’s energy wasn’t focused on him.
“Tonight’s was just fine,” she assured him. She was so in control now. She could do anything she wanted with him. Which, on one level, was a cool feeling, this power over a boy, but on another, a more meaningful one, it felt tacky. She didn’t want to have control over Jeremy, especially now. Soon enough, she knew, they were going to have their moment of reckoning. It was going to be an ugly scene.
She had made her decision, earlier in the day. She was going to have to let him know what she knew about him, and more importantly, who her mother was. Maybe she would pretend it had been a coincidence, the two of them getting together, that if he hadn’t brought Maria Estrada up, she never would have made the connection. But he wasn’t stupid. He would see through that. And he’d be hurt.
He should have gone to the police. This conflict wouldn’t exist if he and his roommate had done the right thing. That was her mantra, which her mother had
drilled into her. If you do the right thing, you’ll never have any regrets.
She caught Tina’s eyes on them. “Over there,” she mouthed, pointing toward the auditorium.
Jeremy, hearing Sophia greet a friend, looked in Tina’s direction. For a moment, Tina froze; then she turned away, but she knew that for a few seconds he had caught a glimpse of her. Oh, God, she prayed, don’t let him recognize me.
Something clicked in Jeremy’s brain. That girl was vaguely familiar, but he couldn’t remember from where. Maybe he’d seen her somewhere else. Or, more likely, she looked like someone else. He turned back to Sophia, dismissing Tina.
Tina, sneaking a glance back at Jeremy, almost collapsed in relief—he hadn’t recognized her, or he would be showing some emotion about it. Instead, he was standing there, patiently being Sophia’s escort, trying to fit in. So she was safe. She hoped.
What was he doing here, especially with Sophia? That was the burning question.
“Not tonight,” Sophia said, in answer to a question from one of the cast members if she was going to go to tonight’s party. “I’m beat.” She took Jeremy’s arm. “I’m going to sit this one out. I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”
He was driving. Kate had dropped her off, because she knew she would go out with Jeremy afterward, and she didn’t want to have to deal with her car. As they were walking across the parking lot, she stopped for a moment and rummaged through her purse.
“I forgot something backstage,” she told him. “I’ll meet you at the car. I’ll just be a second.”
“I’m parked over there,” he said, pointing. “Do you want me to come with you?”
“You don’t have to. Wait for me there. I’ll just be a second.”
She ran across the parking lot and around the side of the dark building. Tina was waiting, huddling against the wall. Sophia charged up to her. “Are you okay?” she asked in concern. “He didn’t recognize you, I’m positive.”
Tina was shaking. “What are you doing with him?” she demanded.
“He’s my date for tonight.”
“Your date?” Tina was in shock. “Are you crazy?” She looked like she was about to come completely unglued. “When did you start dating him?”
“The night of the party. After I dropped you off, I went back looking for Rory, the boy I’d been with. He had already left, but Jeremy was still there.”
“Jeremy?” Tina asked.
“That’s his real name. The boy you were with.”
“Jeremy.” Tina tried the name out on her tongue. She nodded. “He feels like a Jeremy, more than a Billy. But why…”
“Did I hook up with him? To try to find out if he knew anything about Maria Estrada’s killing, what do you think?”
Tina collapsed against the wall. “You’re going to get me into trouble, Sophia,” she moaned. “After you promised you wouldn’t. You’re not a good friend, Sophia. I trusted you, and you backstabbed me.”
“No, no, no,” Sophia protested furiously. “I didn’t! It’s the opposite, don’t you get it? If I learned about it from him, you wouldn’t have to be involved. That’s why I did it, so my mother wouldn’t have to out you. I did it to protect you, Tina, I swear it!”
Tina shook her head. “I should never have told you anything,” she lamented. “I should have kept my stupid mouth shut.”
“No,” Sophia said. She put her arm around Tina. She could feel Tina trembling. “You did the right thing. Which is what I’m trying to do.” She took a step back, so Tina could have some space. “You can’t hide from this, Tina. You can’t be here in this country but not be here, do you know what I mean? You can’t hide in the shadows for the rest of your life. You won’t have a life if you do that.”
Tina’s head bobbed up and down slowly. “I know that,” she said. “But what can I do?” she asked disconsolately. “I have to protect my family.”
“Your family won’t get hurt. My mom will make sure of that. I promise.”
Tina looked at her with wan eyes. “I want to believe you, Sophia. But I can’t now. Not when you’ve already broken a promise to me.”
Sophia’s heart sank. Tina was the one person in the world she didn’t want to hurt, because she was the most vulnerable, and because she had put her trust in Sophia. Who had violated it. She had done it for good cause, because she didn’t have a choice; so she had thought. But of course, she did have a choice. She could have stayed out of everything. Her mother and Luke Garrison were the ones who should be doing this, not her. She was just a kid in high school.
But if she hadn’t gotten involved, Steven McCoy, an innocent man, might go to jail for the rest of his life for a crime he hadn’t committed. Which maybe Jeremy’s friend Peter had.
This is why life sucks sometimes, she thought. Because no matter what decision you make, somebody gets fucked over.
“I’ll protect you,” she promised Tina. “You won’t get hurt. I swear it.”
They stared at each other, two new friends, so wanting to trust the other, but not able to now. Sophia started to reach out to Tina, who turned and ran away from her, into the shadows.
They went to the cast party after all. Sophia didn’t want to be alone with Jeremy, who had been all over her as soon as they got into his car. She had rebuffed him as nicely as she could, claiming post-play fatigue.
It was after one in the morning by the time he brought her home. They parked on the street in front of her house. A light was on in the kitchen, but the rest of the house was dark.
Jeremy looked at it. “This is where you live?” he asked.
She nodded. “Home sweet home.”
“It’s nice. I like those old Craftsman cottages.”
What a charmer, she thought. He’d say anything to try to please her. She yawned, more noticeably than she needed to.
“It’s late,” she sighed. “I’ve had a really long day.” She smiled at him. “Thanks for coming. I’m really glad you did.”
“Me, too.”
The moment was awkward. Sophia gathered herself. “I’d better go in,” she said. “I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”
She wouldn’t, but he’d call her, leave a message, call again, and again and again and again, like the pathetic loser Jon Favreau played in Swingers. She didn’t know what was harder, being in love or having somebody be in love with you who you didn’t want to be in love with. Love hurts: the song clanged in her head.
“Can I come in?” he asked.
Before she could come up with an excuse—“I don’t want to wake my mom up” sounded so sixth grade—he said, “I really need to use the bathroom.”
“Okay,” she acquiesced. “Just be quiet, okay?”
They entered on tiptoe. Sophia shut the door behind them as quietly as she could. She led him into the kitchen. “There,” she said, pointing to a door off the mudroom that led to the backyard.
Jeremy went into the bathroom, closing the door behind him. Sophia took a carton of orange juice out of the refrigerator and poured herself a glass. As she was about to put it back she caught herself, and poured one for him.
The pipes in the old house groaned as he flushed the toilet. Damn it, she thought, that could wake up the dead. She heard the sink running. Then he came out.
She handed him a glass of juice. “Thanks,” he said. He swallowed half of it down in one gulp. He looked around the room. “This is real homey. How long have you lived here?”
“Not too long.” She didn’t want him to know any of the particulars of her life.
He came close to her. “Where can we go?” he asked.
“Nowhere,” she said quietly. “The house is too small. You can hear everything.”
“We can be quiet.”
He took her in his arms and began to kiss her. Her instinct was to resist, but she managed to hold back on her feelings. A few days ago they had been all over each other. To suddenly become an ice maiden would seem suspicious.
They moved like slow dancers across the room,
him pushing her, her giving ground, so that he couldn’t get as close as he wanted. As they reached the edge of the wall near the stove he reached up and turned off the light. The room was suddenly dark. Low shafts of moonlight came through the windows over the sink.
“Jeremy…” She was trying to keep in control, without making any noise that would wake up her mother.
His hands were on her ass, pulling her to him, the fingers reaching between her legs for the crack of her behind. She squirmed away, pushing up against the cabinet that held the dishes and glasses.
“Jeremy,” she whimpered again.
His mouth went to her neck, nibbling the nape below her ear. She squirmed against him, trying to push him away, but he was bigger and stronger. His free hand snaked under her top, reaching for her breast.
What have I gotten myself into, she thought? This is what happens when you cocktease a boy. He takes you seriously.
A light went on in the front hallway. Padded footsteps made their way toward them. Sophia twisted out of Jeremy’s grip. She flicked on the light switch. Her mother, in a robe over her nightgown, was standing in the doorway.
“Oh.” Kate put her hand to her mouth.
All three of them froze in place for a moment. Jeremy began backing away, tucking his shirttail into his pants.
“Mom, this is…”
“I’m sorry,” Kate stammered. “I didn’t know you were home. I heard a noise and thought…” She smiled apologetically. “Good thing I didn’t bring my gun with me,” she said, trying to make it sound like a joke.
That would have ripped it, Sophia thought. Poor Jeremy would have gone headfirst out the window.
“Mom, this is Jeremy,” she said. “I’ve told you about him.” She was sure her lipstick was smeared all over her face. Her mother was going to get the completely wrong impression about their relationship. “Jeremy, this is my mom, Kate Blanchard.”
“Hello, Mrs. Blanchard,” Jeremy mumbled. He hoped she wasn’t noticing his erection. He dropped his arms in front of his pants to try to hide it.
“I didn’t mean to butt in on you like this,” Kate said.
