by Brinda Berry
I put my drink on the floor. My fingers itch to pick up her phone. It stops buzzing. I lean forward and rub my face.
When I discovered Raquel’s cheating, she denied it. She said I was overreacting and I was micromanaging her life. I believed her and let it go.
Two weeks later, I walked in to a restaurant I hadn’t visited in years. The Pelican is the first place I took Raquel when we were freshman. Their white tablecloths and view of the city impressed her enough to get me a second date.
That day, she sat with her chair close to a guy in a suit. I walked toward them when I saw her hand on his purple tie. She’d straightened it and laughed. Pulled him to her for a kiss.
Later, she made a ridiculous statement. My calendar said I’d be having a business lunch with my father across town. She’d say, “You shouldn’t have been there.” As if her cheating were my fault.
My only consolation is she cheated on the guy soon after. He should’ve hidden his calendar from her.
I pick up my water bottle from the floor, ignore the renewed buzzing of the phone, and walk down the stairs. “Phone’s ringing,” I say.
She gives me a sharp look. “Oh?”
“I didn’t touch it. But it rang several times. Maybe it’s important.” I sit at my desk instead of returning to the chair at her side. Distance is what I need at the moment. I gaze at my monitor, not really seeing it.
Her chair squeaks when she stands and I look up, despite my vow to concentrate on something, anything, besides her for the rest of the afternoon.
“I owe you an explanation,” she says.
“You don’t owe me anything.”
“But I do. Two people have my number. Gunner and my friend, Beck, who keeps calling me. He blames himself for my leaving home. Beck lets me know how things are at home.” She paces to the office window and looks out.
“Can you answer one thing for me? Is he the one who left the bruises?”
She turns around. “Beck wouldn’t do anything to hurt me.”
Jealousy crashes into me, but I tamp it down. I have too many questions. At least she’s confiding in me. I want to ask if he’s the ex-boyfriend, but I won’t. “Is he bothering you? With the phone calls?”
“No. Beck is Gunner’s best friend and like a brother to me.”
“What about your brother? You talk with him since you’ve been here?”
Now she looks pensive, walking to the front of my desk and pacing. “Twice. He wants me to come home. I can’t. I can’t do it.” Her voice trembles but she still gives me a smile.
I get to my feet and move to her. “Hey, it’s all right. No one can make you do anything.” I don’t plan to touch her. But the look on her face slays me. My good intentions fall away forgotten. I fold her into my arms.
Nothing sexual. No expectations.
Her voice is muffled against my chest. “Gunner nearly killed my ex-boyfriend. I can’t be the cause of that.”
I’m stroking the back of her head, breathing in her scent, ecstatic to have her in my arms. She’s exposing herself to me and I’ll take even the little bit she offers.
“You know what I really need?” My lips press against the top of her head. She can probably feel my smile.
“What?”
“Sno cone.”
She’s silent for so long I wonder if she even heard me. I lift my head and bend to see her face.
“You’re kidding. As in the icy treats for little kids?”
“Did I say sno cone?” I deepen my voice to a baritone. “I meant a six-pack of beer.” I lose the kidding tone. “You have something against sno cones?”
She pushes off my chest. “It’s not even noon. We can’t up and leave the office.”
“Oh but we can. This is why it’s good to be the boss. Some days I have to hit the sno cones early.” I grab my keys from the desk and walk to the door.
“You are crazy.”
“Good crazy, right?”
“Yeah. I like your kind of crazy.” She walks out after me.
Ten minutes later, we’re at a parking lot with a trailer selling sno cones. There’s a customer in front of us with two kids and an older man with his wife. Everybody’s happy—the very reason why I like this place.
She probably thinks I made up a destination to divert her attention from her problems, and this is partially true. And it’s not like I’m a sno cone aficionado or some shit like that.
After moving here, I drove past this place every day for two weeks. One day I saw a couple standing while they ate the cones they’d bought. A little girl stood between them, a kid the perfect blend of mom and dad. They had no idea of the picture they painted.
I ask for the same flavor I’ve ordered each time I stop. Veronica chooses a pink bubblegum, which causes me to smile.
We stand underneath an awning at the end of the trailer and eat our cones. Her tongue darts out, scooping up the flavored ice, and mesmerizes me.
“Damn good, huh?” I can’t eat mine for watching the way her lips suck on the ice. Some people may eat oysters for an aphrodisiac. Hell, I just need to watch her eat a sno cone.
“Um-hmm.” She wipes off the corner of her mouth.
The lady who was in line before us now sits on a picnic bench with her boys. The older one has started to whine because he’s dropped his cone. The mother grabs his arms and tells him to hush. I look away when she meets my gaze. “Was it tough growing up without your parents?” I ask.
“No,” she answers without hesitation. “It was tougher when they were around. Once they were gone, it got better.”
I nod and look past her head at the traffic. “It’s good you had your brother then.”
“And Grandpa Tom. He had legal custody of us. Gunner could’ve taken care of himself when Jerry and my mom were convicted.” She shrugs. “Gunner and I both really knew how to live on our own. When Jerry and Gunner moved in, I was thirteen. Mama was gone all the time. Then she and Jerry were gone.”
“What did they do?”
“To go to prison?” She scoops pink crushed ice into her mouth. “Cooking meth. Dealing. Shot a police officer.”
I force a neutral expression. My displeasure at having a father who couldn’t keep his hands off his secretary seems less tragic. “So, Gunner isn’t your real brother?”
“Oh, sure he is. Just not related by blood.” She takes a few steps to the trailer counter and picks up a long-handled plastic spoon.
I study her efforts to dig out the remaining ice in her cone. “When I picked you up and you had those bruises. So, not Gunner…”
She gives me a shocked look. “Why would you think that?”
“Are you ever going to tell me? Don’t you trust me?”
She ignores the question and tosses her paper cone in the nearest trashcan. “It’s not about trust. It’s about protecting people.”
I don’t follow her logic. “Why would you protect the person who did this?”
She rubs her fingers across her mouth and looks at the roof line of the trailer. “What would you do if you knew? Anything?”
“Make sure it never happens to you again.” My bold answer borders on cocky. She doesn’t have to be afraid. I’m not.
“Yeah. But you don’t know who you’re dealing with. Gunner would ruin his life for me in a heartbeat. He could have. That’s what would have happened if I’d stayed.” She gives me an overly cheerful smile.
“And you can count on me. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
“That’s exactly what I’m afraid of.” She sighs like I’m being a stubborn child. “Listen. I know how good you are.” Veronica places her hand on my chest over my heart. For a second, I swear her eyes grow heated as her fingers curl against the cotton of my shirt. “You don’t have to prove anything to me.”
I grab her hand and press it into me. “It makes me sick you can’t move on from whatever this is. Can’t you give me his name?”
One corner of her mouth tips up. “Sometimes if you call up S
atan, he appears.” Her shaky voice startles me even more than her words.
It’s like she’s running from the devil.
16
Veronica
It’s a Saturday, a day off. At the Gimme Gas, I always worked on weekends, so the concept of a free Saturday is new for me. Malerie and I lay beside the pool. The stereo speaker blasts some tunes from her favorite band, Jelly Bean Queen, and she periodically explains the meaning to certain lyrics along with song critiques and random commentary.
I adjust the top of my bikini and roll onto my stomach. “And why does that line mean you have to take risks in life when he says stuff about riding fast in a car?”
“Picture this,” she says. “You get in your car and drive below the speed limit.”
“So I won’t get a ticket.”
“I’m not finished. You drive so slow it takes you a long time to arrive at your destination.”
“But I don’t run into the back of someone’s Audi because I was in a big hurry.”
She lifts her head from her lounge chair to give me an amused look ending in an eye roll, and continues. “I don’t think Collin cares in the least. Back to the explanation. If all you do is concentrate on the speed and being careful, you miss out on all the things that make riding in a car exciting—the wind, the rev of the engine, the thrill of the ever-changing landscape.”
“You make me laugh.” I sit and grab the suntan lotion. The midday sun warms me to the point that I may fall asleep at any moment. I would snooze if not for Malerie’s humorous chattering.
Malerie sighs. “I’m so happy to be finished with summer session. You don’t mind working over here some, do you?”
“No, it’s been fun.” I rub lotion onto my legs before lying back.
“Hey, you should show me where you found the screen for buying that Google ad.”
“Mal, just put search terms in the box—the same as looking for a designer bag.”
“Not the same,” she says and waves her hand above her head dismissively.
Malerie’s funny, smart, and brutally honest—at least honest with me. This last quality has put me into a position of knowing some odd things about her.
She’s addicted to online shopping. There’s no crime if they can afford it. I have the funny feeling Ace doesn’t know.
“Will you put sunscreen on my back?” Malerie shades her eyes with one hand. “I think I’ll flip now.”
I drizzle the lotion on her and smear it over her shoulder blades and down her back. “You and Ace date for a long time?”
She laughs with her chin perched on folded arms. “No, not really. I’m not even sure we dated. We sort of fell together by circumstance, you know?”
“Hmm…” I wipe my hands on her towel. “Where is the wedding going to be?”
“Good question.”
I’m shocked. I figured Malerie would’ve planned the entire thing by now. “I don’t know anything about weddings … really. But you do know you can’t show up somewhere and get married.”
She turns her head to peer at me. “Thanks. As if I needed to feel any more overwhelmed.”
“Hey now. No getting stressed. You have college and a business. A wedding plan will be a piece of white fluffy cake.”
She bangs her head on the chair cushion. “I cannot order a wedding online. I hate going into stores. I simply won’t do it. And it’s not a big deal, right? I don’t have people to invite. It will be me and Ace. That’s it.”
“What about witnesses?”
“Argh,” she groans. “Stop it.”
“You don’t have anyone you want to ask?”
“You.” She hops up into a sitting position. “You and Collin. You guys will come. Say yes.”
“Well, yes. I can come if I’m still here.” The last words feel razor sharp, biting into my throat.
Her brow furrows. “What do you mean if? Of course you’ll be here. We plan to get married within a month.”
“My job is temporary.”
“Why? Why not stay? You’re learning everything so quickly. I’m happy to turn over things to you that I hated doing. Collin’s happier. What’s the problem? We love you. And I don’t love everybody.”
I close my eyes and lie down on my back. “I can’t. I want to but I can’t.”
“That’s ludicrous. You can do anything you want.”
“You don’t understand.”
“Then make me. Tell me what’s so important about leaving.”
“There’s someone who wants to find me.” I keep my eyes closed and hold my breath. “I’m too close to home living here. End of story.”
Her hand touches my shoulder and I open my eyes. She pulls me to my feet. “I want to show you something,” she says.
Instead of leading me to the carriage house, she pulls me along to the back of the mansion.
“What are we doing?” I dig my bare heels into the bristly rug at the back door.
“We’re going inside.” She lifts a door panel on the house and presses a series of button until there is a click. “Come on.” She pulls my hand. “This is my house.”
“You’re kidding. Yours?”
She tilts her head. “Yeah. But don’t look so impressed.”
Malerie walks through first. There’s a room at the back with a sink and laundry machines. Towels are stacked on a shelf and an ironing board sits to the side with a collared shirt thrown over one end.
“So why don’t you guys live in this house?” I gaze at the furniture in the front room, covered in white cloths.
She turns to walk upstairs. “Too much room. Too many memories. Too much cleaning!”
I laugh. “Rich people problems.” The words are out of my mouth before I realize how they sound. I suck in a breath. “That was awful. I didn’t mean anything by it.”
She laughs, deep and throaty. “Oh the problems of the poor little rich girl.”
“Really—”
She holds up a hand without turning around. “It’s fine. I know how it looks on the surface.”
“I know you’re not like that.”
She pauses and looks down at the entry hall. “This was a lonely place. My uncle’s house. I wanted a place of my own and this couldn’t be it. You understand?”
The wood stairs creak on my next step. “Sure. The loft has been perfect for me. I liked my bedroom at home, but it’s Gunner’s trailer. All his friends are always there.”
She glances back at me with a concerned expression.
“Oh, they didn’t bother me. It was only crowded. Guys watching football games and playing cards. You know how it is.”
“Nope,” she says. “I’ve been alone most of my life. This was my room after I came to live with Uncle JT.”
It’s enormous with framed posters on one wall. Not cheap glossy images like in a dorm room, but heavy frames from the art section of a store. “Wow. It’s very nice.”
She turns to me. “I thought I was happy here. I lied to myself about it. I was afraid most of the time. Then my life fell apart a little more.”
I nod, not meeting her eyes and walking over to look at the things on her walls. “But you’re fine now. Because of Ace?”
“I’m fine now because of me. Because I had to learn to take someone’s hand. Ace offered me help and I took it.”
“Fairy tale ending.”
“Maybe,” she says with a shrug. “It’s not all bluebirds singing around my head, bringing me flowers from Prince Ace, but yeah. It’s pretty nice.”
I can’t help but laugh. “Gotta love the vision.”
“You are so imagining my boyfriend in tights. I see it on your face. Stop it.”
“I’m not,” I say, laughing harder now. “Okay, now I am only because you put it in my head.”
“Oh, no. You are not putting the blame on me.” She nods for me to follow her back to the staircase.
“You’re crazy. And fun.”
One corner of her mouth lifts. “Yeah? I like how you laugh a lot.
I’d like to keep you around. I really want you to stay for a while. You can hide in St. Louis as well as you can across the world. No one will know you’re here.”
“You think so?”
“I know it. Come on. Give this place a chance. Give Collin a chance.”
We make it to the back door before I break the silence. “Okay,” I say as much to myself as to her. “I’ll stay awhile.”
* * *
Malerie and I spend the rest of the afternoon poolside. She sets up a fan blowing misted cool air on us and I laze happily, each pass of the artificial breeze making me smile.
“Bubble gum or mints?” she murmurs. Her face is smashed into the lounge chair and I strain to hear her.
“Mints.” I close my eyes but turn my head in her direction. “Blake Shelton or Adam Levine?”
She clears her throat as if I’m being ridiculous. “Adam,” she says. “I guess it’s Blake all the way for you?”
“Um-hmm…” I sigh.
“Carrot cake or cheesecake?” She moans. “I am so hungry.”
“Quit talking about food then.” I pause to give this one thought. “Cheesecake.” I’m determined to think of something besides food. Food would mean getting up from the chair. “Wedding dress. White or ivory?”
“I guess white. I look great in white. Ivory? No.” She makes a grunting sound as she turns over in her chaise. “You need ivory. Definitely. With your blonde hair.”
“I guess.” I’ve never pictured myself in a wedding dress. The Gimme Gas magazine rack had a bride’s magazine with the most beautiful gowns. Expensive clothes. Dresses for people like Malerie.
“Trust me. I’m right. And I wish I were doing the whole dress thing. Hey,” she says with a questioning lilt.
“Yeah?”
“You promise you will come to the wedding?”
“I already said I would.” I shield my eyes with my hands. “I promise.”
She grabs sunglasses from beside her and puts them on, preventing me from seeing her eyes through the dark lenses. “Then you can’t back out,” she says.
“For heaven’s sake, I said I’ll come.”
“Good. I had this idea a minute ago.”
