Susie Marie pouted. “You haven’t been to the club with me in over a month, Milo. You’re ignoring your constituents.”
“This weekend,” he said as he folded the paper. Then he stuffed the last crust of toast in his mouth, washed it down with the last swallow of cold, over-creamed coffee, and stood up. “Things good for you, Sunshine?” he asked his sullen daughter.
“Fine,” she said.
He kissed her on the top of her head, patted his wife’s shoulder, and said, “I’ll be home late.”
“Have a nice day,” she said.
Milo knew she’d have a nice day. She’d burden their already-to-the-limit credit cards, then she’d go for a facial and a tanning and a swim and a tennis lesson, maybe a massage, and as soon as she was tight and tan and squeaky clean, she’d fuck some young kid at the club until he couldn’t see straight, then she’d come home and make dinner for their daughter.
Of course Milo didn’t go to the club anymore; there wasn’t a single room there that he could be in or event he could attend without counting at least another half dozen men who’d had his wife. And the list grew on a weekly basis. It was humiliating, but he didn’t have time to deal with it. Not yet. An unfaithful spouse was the least of his worries at the moment. She’d get her comeuppance sooner or later, but getting rid of her was going to be a tricky maneuver, so he had to make sure everything was in place beforehand. He couldn’t afford—not legally, not financially, not politically—to act in haste in ditching the perfect political wife, whore that she may be.
Nope, he had bigger troubles, and they began with the dead guy by the train tracks and they ended with the easement that the city had granted to the railroad on a ninety-nine-year lease that was up for renegotiation. The land that York was camping on was in limbo, being in no particular jurisdiction at the moment—not the city’s, not the railroad’s. And the railroad guys were making noises about renegotiating the lease instead of moving the whole line three miles east, and if they did that, then Milo Grimes was in deep shit. Because he had already sold the property to his Golim Corp and, through his Golim Corp, had sold the land to a Japanese development firm for a very handsome profit. Enough to pay for Susie Marie’s lifestyle plus.
The environmentalists were all for the railroad moving, of course; turning old train tracks into bike paths was the new green thing to do. It would be a good thing for the city to get that ugly noise of a train out of the middle of town, especially since West Wheaton was too small to warrant a stop. So the train was a noisy nuisance, and it took up valuable real estate, but nobody knew just exactly how valuable besides Milo Grimes, and it was his business to make sure that nobody else found out just exactly how valuable it was, either. He wondered if somehow he could get rid of this problem and the wife problem at the same time.
Hmmm. Now there was an idea, he thought as he climbed out of his Mercedes at City Hall.
“Good morning, Mr. Mayor.” Kathleen, his secretary, greeted him as usual, with a warm smile, a hot cup of coffee and a sheaf of pink message slips.
“Those railroad papers ready?” he asked.
“Yes, but the meeting’s been cancelled.”
“Says who?” He snatched the While You Were Out slips from her hand, thunder rolling in his head.
“Mr. Ashton’s secretary called about ten minutes ago.” She set the coffee cup down on a coaster on his desk.
“Resched?” he asked, shuffling the messages. He couldn’t find the one from Ashton, although there were two from Oshiro.
Kathleen shrugged.
“Lease is up the day after tomorrow,” Grimes said, looking at her as if she had the answers.
She shrugged again.
“What kind of game is he playing?”
“Raise the rent?” she said as a helpful suggestion.
“Yeah, thanks,” he said, you useless cunt. “Get him on the phone, willya?”
“Right away.” She turned and left, and Grimes couldn’t even enjoy the view of her retreating backside. Ashton had to sign off on the renewal so the sale could go through as planned, with a double-escrow closing. That way Golim Corp need never be recorded as an interim owner. The property went directly from the city to Oshiro according to the recorded documents. If there were a delay, or if the railroad decided to renew, Milo Grimes could kiss his ass good-bye.
The intercom buzzed, but instead of answering Katheen, Grimes punched the blinking light. “Mr. Ashton!” he said, too loudly, too brightly.
“No, Milo, it’s Steve Goddard.”
Shit. Grimes looked at the phone and then at his office door as if both AT&T and Kathleen were in traitorous league, determined to ruin him. “What’s up?”
“Two things. The first is that the ID on the dead guy is a Wayne Haas—two a’s—most recently of Las Vegas. His fingerprints came up as a small-time hood with lots of debt, too many girlfriends and loose, small-time connections to the wrong kind of people. Did time a few years ago for fraud. Coroner hasn’t done the autopsy yet, but he’s looked the body over. Blunt instrument to the head, multiple fractures and contusions consistent with getting whacked on the head and pushed off a train.”
“So?”
“So York and the guys had nothing to do with it.”
“Meaning?”
“York’s not leaving, Milo, and I don’t think we should make him.”
“Excuse me?” Grimes felt his blood pressure rise ten percent. “You don’t think we should make him? You don’t think?”
“He’s old, Milo. Give him a month and he’ll go to the county home of his own accord. The rest will disband, I’m telling you. But if you force him out over this death–”
“You’re telling me?” Ten more blood-pressure points. “You don’t tell me anything, Sheriff. I tell you. The railroad is about to renegotiate the lease on that piece of city property, and they’re reluctant to do it with that little hepatitis breeding ground down there. That lease is very important to the economic security of our town, not to mention your cushy salary, Sheriff. So you just stop telling me what you do or do not think, and start doing what I pay you to do.”
“With all due respect–”
“Fine,” Grimes said as his face began to fill with superheated blood. “Never mind. I’ll get that snake pit cleaned up and don’t you get pissy about how I do it.” He slammed down the phone and then stared at it for a long moment. AT&T was out to get him.
He looked at his watch. There’s no telling where Deputy Travis was, but he would be the one to fix this problem. Grimes picked up the deceitful telephone and dialed Travis’s home. He’d leave an urgent message.
But the machine didn’t answer the phone at Travis’s house, and neither did the deputy. A woman did, and Milo Grimes would know that beige voice anywhere. “Susie Marie?” he said incredulously.
There was a long pause, a click and a dial tone.
“Goddamn,” Milo Grimes said softly and sipped his coffee. He went over the telephone number he’d dialed, and yes, he’d called Travis’s house. Milo hadn’t dialed his home or her cell phone by mistake. He took a deep breath, sat back in his chair and steepled his hands in front of him. He didn’t want this to hurt him, but damn it, it hurt his pride to think that his slutty wife was screwing every young thing in West Wheaton. Didn’t she even have enough respect for him to be even a little bit discreet?
Apparently not.
The familiar fantasies of revenge began to float up in his consciousness, but that wasn’t good. It wasn’t good for business. Revenge had no place in the handbook of politics, marriage, or business. He’d like to take that secretary of his, that Kathleen, with the sweetest little ass he’d ever seen, for a ride until her brains exploded, but that would hardly constitute revenge. That would just be a dead-end fuck. Kathleen would get attached or worse, Grimes would pay the cost somehow, and Susie Marie wouldn’t care. Nope, no revenge. Revenge, while it would be sweet to just squeeze the throat of that two-timing little whore of a wife, would be a ba
d thing for Milo and his future, not to mention his daughter. No, he thought, and took a deep breath, there needs to be a way I can use this information to my advantage. Knowledge is power.
The problem was, of course, that Susie Marie knew that he knew.
But Deputy Travis didn’t, and she wouldn’t be the one to tell him. Travis probably wouldn’t be able to get it up if he knew that everybody—the mayor in particular—knew he was screwing the city’s first lady, and Susie Marie wouldn’t want that, not one little bit.
Grimes leaned forward and punched the intercom button. “Kathleen, page Deputy Travis for me, will you?”
If he couldn’t interfere with Travis’s performance in one way, he’d interfere with it in another. Meanwhile, he and Travis had a secret they could keep together.
~ ~ ~
“So it turns out,” Clover said to Denny, “the railroad doesn’t own this land after all. Sly was wrong. They’ve got a lease on it. It belongs to the city.”
“Who cares?”
“Listen, this is important,” she said, and smoothed her new dress down over her knees. “The city can’t throw you off land that is leased by the railroad. It’s like the city coming in and throwing somebody out of your apartment. They can’t do it. It’s your apartment, and you can have whoever you want in it. The railroad has to evict you.”
“So we don’t have to worry about Deputy Dawg? He was here with railroad guys, though, those were the ones with the ball bats.” Denny leaned in close and whispered, “You look so good in that dress that I can almost taste you.”
Clover pushed him away.
“How do you know this, Clover?” York said. He splashed more coffee into his broken, handleless mug.
“I went back to city hall to look up the records. If we’re going to fight, we have to know who we’re fighting. Or who to negotiate with. And it isn’t the sheriff, or the mayor, or the railroad goons, because the lease on the land is up tomorrow and it hasn’t been renegotiated yet. At least the new lease hasn’t been filed in court.”
“I don’t know if that’s good,” Sly said, wearing a brand new teal golf shirt. “The enemy is camouflaged and can snipe from a tree at two hundred yards.”
“It’s very good,” York said. “It means that the sheriff has to protect us from violence.”
“There’s no protection from violence,” Sly said. “You have to report the violence after it happens in order for the police to do something. They provide no protection at all.”
“He’s right,” Denny said, wearing a new shirt, new jeans, new socks, new shoes, and new leopard-print underwear that he intended to show Clover right soon. Sooner than soon, if she didn’t stop looking so adorable. The dress he picked out for her was perfect. Absolutely perfect. He was very proud of his shopping excursion. Everybody looked spiffy.
“I want no violence,” York said.
“That part won’t be up to you,” Sly said. “Those who are violent, that’s their way. So listen, I have a plan. And it means we need another of those slingshots, Denny. Maybe two more, if Clover will work with one.”
“Back to Walmart,” Denny said. “No problem.”
“Self-defense, York,” Sly said. “We’re not attacking anybody. We’re just living here.”
York nodded, then lay back on his cushions and turned his face away from them. The meeting was over. Everybody had their assignments: Clover had to put out, Denny had to steal two more slingshots and the shot that went with them, Sly had to devise the strategy, and York had to reconcile himself to the whole ugly business. Nobody had an easy job, except maybe for Clover.
~ ~ ~
“Who was on the phone?” Travis asked as he stepped out of the steamy bathroom, a dingy towel around his waist.
“Telemarketer.”
“You shouldn’t answer the phone,” he said as he adjusted the volume on his radio. “I’m supposed to be patrolling.”
“I’ve got something for you to patrol,” Susie Marie said, then opened her legs and showed him that she wasn’t wearing panties under her short tennis skirt.
“Ain’t that pretty,” Travis said, and pulled off his towel. “Makes my tongue hard.”
“Clearly that’s not all it makes hard,” Susie Marie said with a giggle, then lay back on her elbows and shimmied out of her skirt. Travis picked up a pretty pedicured foot and kissed the arch, then slid his lips up her calf, up her thigh. “I love giving you these tennis lessons,” he whispered. They locked eyes, for a moment. He loved the way she looked in heat. Lips slightly parted, brow slightly furrowed, thousand-yard stare. He palmed her fur and began to massage in slow circles.
She collapsed backward onto the bed.
“Gimme those tits,” he said, and she began to unbutton her cotton blouse, exposing erect nipples that pushed hard against expensive lace.
“Good,” he said, and kept his eye on them as he licked his lips and made himself ready to send her into the zone.
Then his pager began to beep.
Susie Marie gasped and slammed her legs closed.
“What?” he said, irritated at the interruption. “Come back here.” He parted her knees and kissed her belly. “Come to me,” he whispered. “Come for me.”
The pager beeped again.
Susie Marie rolled away from him, right to the edge of the bed, sat up and began buttoning her blouse.
“Hey,” he said.
“I can’t concentrate with that damned thing going off all the time,” she said.
He looked down at his zinging erection and wondered if she’d at least give it a little good-bye kiss.
She stood up and grabbed her skirt.
Guess not. He gave it a sorrowful mental farewell, got up and walked to his pants that had been flung over the chair. He fumbled for the pager that was hooked to his belt.
The mayor’s office.
Travis wasn’t very smart, but neither was he stupid. “The phone,” he said.
She zipped her skirt and sat in the chair, on top of his uniform pants, to put on her tennis shoes.
He grabbed her wrist. “He called here and you answered the phone.”
“Let go of me,” she said.
“Fuck,” Travis said, and sat down hard on the bed. “I’m screwed.”
“He doesn’t care,” Susie Marie said as she stood up and finger-combed her hair.
“I care,” Travis said.
“Fuck you,” she said, grabbed her purse and walked out, leaving him feeling very naked indeed.
After a few minutes, the pager sounded again. Travis picked up the phone and dialed the mayor’s private number. He hoped there was a chance the mayor hadn’t recognized his own wife’s voice. Fat chance.
Regardless, there was no place for Travis to hide, so he listened to the phone ring, his heart hammering.
Luckily, the mayor had other things on his mind. Things that interested Travis—maybe not as much as pussy—but coming in a close second. And when they hung up, Travis was almost convinced that the mayor knew nothing about Travis’s involvement with his slutty wife.
Whew. Close call, Travis thought, and began to dress.
~ ~ ~
Morning drive-time radio woke Brenda. She cracked an eye at the clock and knew that work was not for her today. She was too depressed.
She slapped the snooze alarm and picked up the telephone. Nobody would be in yet—she could call in sick and leave word on their answering machine.
“This is Brenda,” she said after the beep, her voice sounded husky with sleep, but could be mistaken for sick. “I’ve got a skull-crunching migraine so I won’t be in. I’m unplugging the phone and going back to bed. I’ll be in tomorrow.” Her voice sounded convincing, she had to admit.
Not even the prospect of a day off raised her spirits. She even had second thoughts. If she stayed home, she’d likely mope and cry and eat ice cream. If she went to work, she might mope, cry, eat less and come away with a paycheck to boot.
Too late.
The radio clicked on again with an advertisement for Gretta’s, West Wheaton’s finest family restaurant, specializing in homemade pies and trucker-sized breakfasts.
A trucker-sized breakfast was exactly what she needed, Brenda decided, and hauled herself out of bed.
An hour later, she had the morning paper. And since the place was packed—due in large part, she imagined, to their advertising agency—Brenda sat at the counter.
Just as Brenda got her first cup of coffee, the man next to her departed, and a lone woman took his still-warm stool a moment later. She smiled tentatively at Brenda. Brenda smiled back. This woman looked tired. She looked more than tired, she looked worn out.
Someone worse off than me, Brenda thought. Now that’s a comfort. “Share the morning paper?” she offered.
The woman smiled again and shook her head in polite refusal. “Too tired to read,” she said. “Coffee, food, bed. Just got off work.”
“Oh,” Brenda said. “I just called in sick. Coffee, food, and something to keep me from slitting my wrists.”
The other woman stared at her and then they both laughed. “I’m Eileen,” the woman said and held out her hand.
Brenda shook it. It was hard to fix an age on Eileen with her makeup, dyed hair, and pucker wrinkles from smoking, but she guessed Eileen wasn’t a whole lot older than she was.
“I work in the bakery,” Eileen explained. “Three to ten. I took off early today. I’m beat.”
“You start at three o’clock in the morning?” Many times, Brenda wasn’t even in bed yet by three a.m.
Eileen gave her a wry smile in return.
They each ordered hearty breakfasts, and Brenda perused the front page while Eileen sat hunched over her coffee. When the food came, Brenda, feeling more hungry for companionship than eggs, sausage, home fries, wheat toast and apple sauce, spoke again. “What is it, do you suppose, with men?”
Eileen barked a harsh laugh as she spread marmalade on her toast. “If you expect nothing, you’ll never be disappointed.”
“I get disappointed anyway,” Brenda said and popped her yolks.
“Yeah,” Eileen said. “Me, too.”
They ate in companionable silence, two discouraged women taking comfort in the fact that they were not alone, if even for a half hour. When finished, Eileen pushed her plate away and pulled her coffee closer. “I’m regenerated,” she said.
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