The trembling began in Georgeanne’s chest and work its way outward. She raised a shaky hand and pressed her fingers to her lips. John had hired a lawyer. He’d said that he wouldn’t, but he’d obviously lied to her. He wanted Lexie, and Georgeanne had blithely given him what he wanted. She’d tried to put aside her misgivings and had allowed John the freedom to spend time with his daughter. She’d tried to disregard her own fears because she’d wanted to do what was right for her child.
“Hurry up and finish your cereal,” she said as she turned from the kitchen. She had to get away, get away from his house and from him.
Within ten minutes Georgeanne had changed her clothes, brushed her teeth and hair, and had thrown everything into the suitcases. Keep the mother happy … Georgeanne felt sick when she thought about how happy he’d made her last night. Sleeping with her had gone above the call of duty.
After another five minutes she had the car loaded. “Come on, Lexie,” she called out as she walked back into the house. She wanted to be gone by the time John returned. She didn’t want a confrontation. She didn’t trust herself. She’d been nice. She’d tried to be fair, but no more. Her anger fueled her like a gas line to a blowtorch. She let it burn uncontrolled through her veins. It was better to feel the rage than the humiliation and soul-numbing hurt.
Lexie walked out of the kitchen, still wearing her purple pajamas. “Are we going somewhere?”
“Home.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s time to go.”
“Is John coming, too?”
“No.”
“I don’t want to go yet.”
Georgeanne opened the front door. “That’s too dang bad.”
Lexie frowned and stomped out of the house. “It’s not Saturday yet,” she pouted as they headed down the sidewalk. “You said we were staying till Saturday.”
“There’s been a change of plans. We’re going home early.” She belted her into the passenger seat, then laid a shirt, shorts, and hairbrush in her lap. “Once we’re on the highway, you can change your clothes,” she explained as she got behind the wheel. She stared the car and put it in reverse.
“I forgot my Skipper in the bathtub.”
Georgeanne stepped on the brakes and looked over at a sullen Lexie. She knew if she didn’t go back in and get the Skipper, Lexie would worry and fret and talk about it all the way back to Seattle. “Which one?”
“The one Mae gave me for my birthday.”
“Which bathtub?”
“The one by the kitchen.”
Georgeanne shoved the car back into park and got out. “The engine is on, so don’t touch anything.”
Lexie’s shrug was noncommittal.
For the first time since childhood, Georgeanne ran. She ran back into the house and into the bathroom. The Skipper doll sat in the soap dish stuck to the tiled wall, and she grabbed it by the legs. She turned around and almost collided with John. He stood in the doorway with his hands planted on the wooden frame.
“What’s going on, Georgeanne?”
Her heart twisted in her chest. She hated him. She hated herself. For the second time in her life, she’d let him use her. For the second time, he’d caused her such pain she could barely breathe. “Get out of my way, John.”
“Where’s Lexie?”
“In the car. We’re not staying.”
His eyes narrowed. “Why?”
“Because of you.” She placed her hands on his chest and shoved.
He moved, but she didn’t get very far before he grabbed her arm and stopped her from opening the front door. “Do you act this way with the other guys you sleep with, or did I just luck out?”
Georgeanne whirled around and lashed out at him with her only weapon. She whacked him on the shoulder with the wet Skipper doll. The doll’s head popped off and flew into the living room. Her rage boiled beneath the surface, and she felt as if her head were about to pop off just like poor Skipper.
John looked from the headless doll in her hand to her face. His brows were raised. “What’s your problem?”
Inbred southern grace, Miss Virdie’s charm lessons, and years of her grandmother’s polite and proper influence turned to ashes within the inferno of her anger. “Get your slimy hand off of me, you immoral son of a bitch!”
His grip tightened and his eyes bored into hers. “Last night you didn’t think I was slimy. I may be a son of a bitch, but not for what we did together. Last night you were hot, I was hard, and we took care of it. It may not have been the wisest choice either of us has ever made, but it happened. Now, deal with it like an adult, for Christ’s sake.”
Georgeanne yanked her arm from his grasp and stepped back. She wished she were big and strong and could hit him really hard. She wished she were quick with cutting words and could slice his heart. But she was neither physically strong or quick under pressure. “You made sure I was real happy last night, didn’t you?”
He blinked. “ ‘Happy’ is as good a word as any, I guess. Although I’d use ‘sated,’ but if you want to use ‘happy,’ that’s fine by me. You were happy. I was happy. We were both pretty goddamn happy.”
She pointed the headless Skipper at him. “You sneaky bastard. You used me.”
“Yeah, when was that? When your tongue was down my throat or when your hand was down my pants? The way I see it, there was some pretty mutual using going on.”
Georgeanne glared at him through her red haze. They weren’t talking about the same thing, yet it was all tied together. “You lied to me.”
“About what?”
Instead of giving him the opportunity to lie again, Georgeanne marched into the kitchen and rewound his answering machine. Then she hit the play button and watched John’s face as his attorney’s voice filled the silent room. His features gave nothing away.
“You’re making too big a deal out of this,” he said as soon as the tape clicked off. “It’s not what you think.”
“Is that your lawyer?”
“Yes.”
“Then any further contact between us will take place through attorneys.” She was deadly calm when she said, “Stay away from Lexie.”
“Not a chance.” He towered over her. A big, powerful man used to getting his way by the sheer force of his will.
Georgeanne wasn’t intimidated. “You have no place in our lives.”
“I’m Lexie’s father, not some made-up asshole named Tony. You’ve lied to her about me all of her life. Now it’s time she knew the truth. Whatever problems we have between us doesn’t change the fact that Lexie is my little girl.”
“She doesn’t need you.”
“Like hell.”
“I won’t let you near her.”
“You can’t stop me.”
She knew that he was probably right. But she also knew that she would do anything and everything to make sure she didn’t lose her daughter. “Stay away,” she warned one last time, then turned to leave. Her steps faltered.
Lexie stood in the doorway to the kitchen. She was still dressed in her pajamas and her hair still stuck up around her head. Her gaze was locked on John as if she’d never seen him before. Georgeanne didn’t know how long Lexie had been there, but she feared what she might have heard. She grabbed Lexie’s hand and dragged her from the house.
“Don’t do this, Georgeanne,” John called after her. “We can work this out.” But she didn’t turn back. She’d given him far too much already. She’d given him her heart, her soul, and her trust. She wouldn’t give him the most important thing in her life. She could live without her heart, but she couldn’t live without Lexie.
Mae picked up the newspaper on Georgeanne’s porch, then walked into the house. Lexie sat on the couch with a raspberry-and-cream-cheese muffin in her hand while the television blared the theme song to The Brady Bunch. Raspberry-and-cream-cheese muffins were Lexie’s favorite and an obvious attempt to soothe the ouchie with sugar. But after what Georgeanne had told her when she’d phoned the night
before, Mae wasn’t sure a gooey muffin would make everything all better.
“Where’s your mom?” Mae asked as she tossed the newspaper on a chair.
“Outside,” Lexie answered without taking her eyes from the screen.
Mae decided to leave Lexie alone for now and stepped into the kitchen to make herself a cup of espresso. Then she headed out back and found Georgeanne standing beside the brick porch pruning her Albertine roses and tossing the dead flowers into a wheelbarrow. For the last three years, Mae had watched Georgeanne diligently coax the tangerine roses up the pergola framing her back door. A profusion of pink foxglove and lavender delphinium crowded flower beds at Georgeanne’s feet and crammed the garden along the fence. Morning dew clung to the delicate petals and wet the bottom half of Georgeanne’s robe. Beneath the orange silk, she wore a wrinkled T-shirt and a pair of white cotton panties. Her hair hung from a ratted ponytail and the mauve fingernail polish on her right hand was badly chipped as if Georgeanne had picked at it. The situation with Lexie was worse than Mae had thought.
“Did you sleep at all last night?” Mae asked from her position on the last step.
Georgeanne shook her head and reached for another wilted rose. “Lexie won’t talk to me. She wouldn’t talk to me yesterday on the drive home, and she won’t talk to me today. She didn’t drift off to sleep until around two a.m.” She tossed another rose into the wheelbarrow. “What’s she doing in there?”
“Watching The Brady Bunch,” Mae answered as she moved across the brick patio. She set her coffee on a wrought-iron table and sat in a matching chair. “When you called last night, you didn’t tell me she was so upset that she couldn’t sleep. That’s not like her at all.”
Georgeanne dropped her hands and looked over her shoulder. “I told you she wasn’t talking. That’s not at all like her either.” She walked toward Mae and set her pruning shears on the table. “I don’t know what to do. I’ve tried to talk to her, but she just ignores me. At first I thought that she might be angry because she was having so much fun at the beach and I made her leave. Now I know that was just wishful thinking on my part. She must have heard John and me arguing.” Georgeanne sank down on the chair beside Mae, a ratty lump of misery. “She knows I lied to her about her father.”
“What are you going to do now?”
“I have to make an appointment to talk to a lawyer.” She yawned and propped her chin on her fists. “I don’t know who yet, or where I’m going to get the money for the legal fees.”
“Maybe John won’t really go through with custody. Maybe if you talk to him, he-”
“I don’t want to talk to him,” Georgeanne interrupted, suddenly alive. She sat up straight in her chair and her eyes narrowed. “He’s a liar and a sneak, and he has no principles at all. He played on my weakness. I should have had sex years ago. I should have listened to you. You were right. I just kind of exploded and became a nymphomaniac. I guess sex isn’t the sort of thing you should put off until you explode.”
Mae felt her jaw drop. “Get out!”
“Oh, I’m out. I’m way out.”
“With the hockey player?”
Georgeanne nodded.
“Again?”
“You’d think I’d have learned the first time.”
Mae didn’t know what to say. Georgeanne was one of the most sexually repressed women she knew. “How’d that happen?”
“I don’t know. We were getting along and it just did.”
Mae didn’t consider herself promiscuous. She just didn’t always say no when she should. By contrast, Georgeanne always said no.
“He tricked me. He was nice and so good with Lexie and I forgot. Well, I didn’t really forget what a jerk he could be, I just sort of let myself forgive.”
Mae didn’t believe in forgiving and forgetting. She liked the Old Testament wrath-of-God stuff and believed in an eye for an eye. But she could see how a good-looking guy like John could make a woman overlook a few things-like being dumped at an airport after a one-night stand-if the woman was attracted to two-hundred pounds of solid muscle, which, of course, Mae was not.
“He didn’t have to go that far. I was giving him everything he asked for. Each time he wanted to see Lexie, I arranged it.” Anger mixed with the tears in Georgeanne’s eyes. “He didn’t have to sleep with me. I’m not a charity case.”
Even on her worst hair day, with dark circles and chipped nails, Mae really didn’t believe any man would consider Georgeanne a charity case. “Do you really believe he made love to you because he felt sorry for you?”
Georgeanne shrugged. “I don’t think it was a real hardship for him, but I know he wanted to keep me happy until he and his lawyer could get together and decide what to do about getting custody of Lexie.” She covered her cheeks with her palms. “It’s so humiliating.”
“What can I do to help?” Mae leaned forward and laid her hand on Georgeanne’s shoulder. She would take on the world for the people she loved. There were times in her life when she’d felt as if she had. Not so much anymore, but when Ray had been alive, she’d fought both their battles, especially in high school when big, athletic guys had thought it funny to beat him with wet towels. Ray had hated PE, but Mae had hated the jocks who ruled gym class. “What do you want me to do? Do you want me to talk to Lexie?”
Georgeanne shook her head. “I think Lexie needs time to sort everything out in her mind.”
“Do you want me to talk to John? I could tell him how you feel and maybe-”
“No.” She wiped her cheeks with the backs of her hands. “I don’t want him to know how badly he’s hurt me again.”
“I could hire someone to break his knees.”
Georgeanne paused before she said, “No. We don’t have enough money to hire a professional hit man, and it’s so hard to find good help without ready cash. Look what happened to Tonya Harding. Thanks for the offer, though.”
“Ahh… what are friends for?”
“I’ve been through this heartache once before with John. Of course, Lexie wasn’t an issue then, but I’ll get through it again. I don’t know how yet, but I will.” Georgeanne pulled her robe securely around her and frowned. “And then there’s Charles. What am I going to tell him?”
Mae reached for her espresso. “Absolutely nothing,” she answered, then took a sip.
“You think I should lie?”
“No. Just don’t tell him.”
“What do I say if he asks?”
She set her coffee back on the table. “That depends on how much you like him.”
“I really like Charles. I know it doesn’t appear that way, but I do.”
“Then lie.”
Georgeanne shoulders sagged and she sighed. “I feel so guilty. I can’t believe I jumped in bed with John. I didn’t even think about Charles. Maybe I’m one of those women you read about in Cosmo who screw up relationships because deep down I don’t think I’m worthy. Maybe I’m destined to love men who can’t love me back.”
“Maybe you should stop reading Cosmo.”
Georgeanne shook her head. “I’ve made such a mess of things. What am I going to do?”
“You’ll get through it. You’re one of the strongest women I know.” Mae patted Georgeanne’s shoulder. She had a lot of faith in Georgeanne’s strength and determination. She knew that her friend didn’t always see herself as a woman with grit, but then Georgeanne didn’t always view herself in an accurate or objective light. “Hey, did I tell you that Hugh, the goalie, called me while you were in Oregon?”
“John’s friend? Why?”
“He wanted to go out on a date.”
Georgeanne stared at Mae for several incredulous moments. “I thought you made your feelings clear the day you ran into him outside the hospital.”
“I did, but he asked again.”
“Really? That beats all with a stick.”
“Yeah, tell me about it.”
“Well, I hope you let him down gently.”
“I did.”
“What did you say?”
“Hell, no.”
Normally Georgeanne and Mae would have debated Mae’s rude rejection. Instead Georgeanne shrugged and said, “Well, I guess you won’t have to worry that he’ll call a second time.”
“He did call a second time, but I think he just wanted to annoy me. He called to ask me if I was still wrestling pit bulls.”
“What did you say?”
“Nothing. I hung up on him, and he’s only called once since then.”
“Well, I’m sure it’s best just to stay away from all hockey players. Best for the both of us.”
“That’s not a problem for me.” Mae thought of telling Georgeanne about her latest boyfriend, but she decided against it. He was married, and Georgeanne tended to moralize about stuff like that. But Mae felt no qualms about sleeping with another woman’s husband as long as he didn’t have children. She didn’t want marriage. She didn’t want to look at the guy’s face over dinner every night. She didn’t want to do his laundry or birth his babies. She just wanted sex, and married men were perfect. She got to call all the shots and controlled when, where, and how often.
She never told Georgeanne how often she dated married men. Even though Georgeanne apparently had a carnal weakness when it came to John Kowalsky, she could be such a prude sometimes.
Chapter Fifteen
After several hours of grueling drills, coaches and players jammed the ice for a two-puck scrimmage. By day three of training camp, the Chinooks were ready for a little fun. Two of the team’s goalies crouched inside the creases at opposite ends of the rink, alert, waiting for someone to fire a rubber biscuit at their heads.
Simply Irresistible Page 25
