“Are those honeysuckle?” Karen asked, happy to step away from Derek. She strode quickly over to inspect the privet bushes, examining the identifying plastic tag on one of the stems. “Oh no, I ordered honeysuckle, these have to go back.”
Gabriel slumped, set the bushes down. Ruben rolled into view with the sod. They exchanged a look. Derek was right. She was fine.
“Let me call and see if they have what I ordered. Maybe we can get this all done today.” Karen told them, heading back into the house.
Tristan was furtively peering out the kitchen window at the workmen as her mother entered through the sliding glass doors.
“Change your clothes.” Karen instructed Tristan. “And put on pants.” There was some real apprehension in Karen’s voice as she pulled the door shut behind her.
Tristan didn’t need to be told twice. She kicked off her high heels and trudged down a hallway after her mother who remembered to take the zipper down on the back of her dress before each of them entered their respective, adjacent bedrooms.
Tristan shut the door behind her. Her bedroom was painted pink, of course. There was a jewelry box, a wooly throw rug, a four-poster bed, a desk, chair, and a laptop perennially turned on to her Facebook page. Tristan slipped out of her dress and draped it over the chair. She quickly threw on a shirt as she started pulling herself into a pair of jeans and was going to check her computer when she noticed the figure of a man moving past her curtained window. That’s odd, isn’t it? Is he supposed to be there? Tristan didn’t know what to think.
Derek, meanwhile, was the one who had drifted past Tristan’s window. Outside, he furtively slipped past another window where the curtains were drawn and continued around a corner of the house. There he found a window with a gap in the curtains.
Derek looked into what was the master bedroom where Karen was currently removing her cover-up. Derek couldn’t believe his good fortune as he leered through the window at Karen as she took off her swimsuit.
Karen, inside the master bedroom, could suddenly feel, like an icy breeze, that she was being watched. Head lowered, she quickly scooped up a bra, underwear, jeans and a shirt, and hurriedly entered the bathroom and shut the door. Was somebody looking through her window? She didn’t want to think about it. Not this second. Just get dressed and get out there.
Karen had finished dressing and was buttoning her jeans on her way to the kitchen when she was startled to find… Derek waiting for her.
“Oh God, you scared me!” She gasped, feeling like she’d been kicked in the head.
“Can I use your washroom?” Derek said, almost deadpan but with nostrils flared.
“Yes of course, there’s one-” Karen offered, pointing in the direction of the family room but he was already moving past her.
“I’ll find it.” Derek spewed dismissively.
Karen watched anxiously as Derek stepped past Tristan who was emerging from her bedroom, and then headed straight down the hallway to the master bedroom. Karen felt sick.
To Derek it was like finding the Holy Grail. Inside the master bedroom bathroom now, the door shut behind him, he picked up Karen’s swimsuit from the floor.
Outside, in the backyard, Gabriel and Ruben looked over from their sodding duties as Derek stuck his head out the bathroom window, triumphantly holding up Karen’s swimsuit. Their mouths dropped open like dumbfounded cavemen. They were used to his antics but could never be sure if his sociopathic personality, borderline or otherwise, had spilled over into an actual aggravated criminal sexual assault.
Gabriel, garden hose end sprayer in his hand, reflexively and always eager to outdo his brazen brother, put the nozzle by his crotch and dispensed a water stream like he was blowing a load of semen. Laughing, he remembered to toss a look to see if the missus of the manor was about or hell, maybe Derek was actually doing her? Nope. Gabriel could see out of the corner of his eye “the mom” looking in his direction. Better stop fucking around. He dropped the hose.
Karen was in the kitchen casting unsettled glances out the screened portion of the sliding glass door in Gabriel and Ruben’s direction. She could see them chuckling at something out of view towards the master bedroom portion of the house. She didn’t want to imagine what they could be laughing at. She picked up her cell phone and dialed a number.
Derek pulled his head back in and shut the master bathroom window. He found the crotch on Karen’s swimsuit and sniffed it. He opened his fly and feverishly began masturbating as he licked gluttonously at the breast pads on the suit.
CHAPTER 3
Anderson, in his Mercedes CLS550 coupe, used the integrated Bluetooth phone system to speed dial a number. A woman’s voice came over the car speaker.
“Good morning, Anderson Construction.” It was Joyce, the office secretary and bookkeeper.
“Hi, Joyce, it’s me.” Anderson got right to it. “Couple of things… can you call that private eye we hired, a year ago or so, and see if he’s available to get together? If he is around, ask him if he can meet me at the office later or I can go to his place, he’s not far from us if I remember correctly. It can be anytime this afternoon, but I want to talk to him in person.”
“Will do.” Joyce answered succinctly.
“And put a call into our window supplier.” Anderson continued. “Tell their rep to call me back. They’re going to ask why so let them know I’m ticked off at the delay in delivering our last order, but don’t let them put you off, just have them call me ASAP.”
“Okay, got it.” Joyce responded. “Oh, and your wife just called, she wants you to stop home.”
Anderson pulled into his driveway in his Mercedes, parking just in front of the dump truck. He might as well have driven up in a chauffeured Bentley.
Derek, Gabriel and Ruben looked over resentfully from their landscaping work as Anderson exited the car and headed into the house.
“What a waste!” Derek offered derisively, at a volume that couldn’t be heard by Anderson. “For what that car costs, I could go to Mexico, buy a boat, and drink tequila for the rest of my life!”
Anderson took his key out of the front door lock and shut the solid oak door behind him.
He found Karen in the kitchen in front of a TV busily preparing lunch. She was visibly relieved at his arrival but covered it up as he grabbed the day’s mail above the backsplash to peruse and sat down next to her at the granite-topped island. She casually leaned over and kissed him.
He liked it when she was affectionate, which was most of the time. She’d been that way ever since they met in a night school class studying CAD (“computer-aided-design”). She was working at an architectural firm at the time. He was using some G.I. Bill credits to pay for his studies while he started his own construction company. They did a lab project together and the rest was history. He’d always be grateful she took him even though it was clear he was damaged goods.
“I thought they were coming tomorrow.” Anderson said matter-of-factly regarding the workmen, shooting a glance into the backyard. “Should look great once the grass is in.”
Anderson’s cell phone rang. It was the standard carrier ringtone. His daughter, Tristan, had wanted him to download a cool ringtone. He didn’t do it.
“Hi, this is Noel…” He listened to the caller for a bit before interrupting. “I’m not being unreasonable. Two weeks ago you told my man there was a problem at the factory. Last week you said it shipped-” Anderson had to listen again as the caller broke in, then Anderson cut him off. “I don’t care what the excuse is. We placed this order well in advance as usual. None of this is custom. If you’re pushing us back to fill a bigger order-” The caller said something else and Anderson replied, “Well, whatever you have to do, work it out, but I want those windows by Monday or we find another supplier.” Anderson calmly hung up, forgetting about the call the same instant. He was not one to grind on work problems or bring them home.
Tristan trudged into the kitchen and sat down on one of the high-back bar stools ri
ght next to her father. She held a flyer in one hand and a self-help book in the other entitled “The Angel In Us.”
“What are you doing home?” He asked Tristan quizzically.
“I let her stay home. She has her dance tonight.” Karen offered, washing some lettuce for sandwiches.
Tristan spun towards her father on the swivel seat. “Dad, I figured out what you can get me for my graduation.” She declared, tilting her head in an achingly adorable way as she held the flyer up for him to see.
He took the leaflet ad from her, scanned it. “An iPhone?!!”
“It has the internet and everything.“ Tristan expounded.
“You’re in eighth grade. “ He said it as if that’s all that needed saying.
“All the kids are getting them.” Tristan countered.
Karen smiled at her rejoinder. It was simple and to the point.
“It’s what, a four-hundred dollar phone?” Anderson groaned.
“You can get one for two-hundred dollars.” Tristan succinctly informed her father.
“You broke your last two, what, you dropped them?” Anderson sighed. “I bought you the latest model…” He was trying to remember, “…a few months ago?”
“Six months ago.” Tristan corrected him, like it was eons in the past. “But it wasn’t an iPhone.”
“The one you have is fine.” Anderson ended the conversation. He thought.
“This one’s broken, too.” Tristan said bringing out her cell phone.
Anderson just looked at her, waited for the explanation.
“It won’t hold a charge. I don’t know what’s wrong with it.” Tristan offered unconvincingly as she fidgeted in the crosshairs of his stare before finally guiltily admitting, “Okay, I dropped this one, too.”
Anderson chuckled moodily and just shook his head.
Karen set the sandwiches down on the countertop and took a seat. “Are you working tonight?” She asked him.
Anderson grabbed a sandwich. “I gotta go by the club, drop off a check for the initiation, meet some more of the members. It shouldn’t take long.”
“Dad, you don’t have to join a club in order to have people like you.” Tristan lectured.
Anderson took the self-help book out of Tristan’s hand and scanned the title on the cover. “You want people to like you?” Anderson flatly remarked. “Pay your bills. Then they’ll love you.”
Tristan and Karen exchanged a look. They were used to his cynicism and simple philosophy on life.
“Dad, distrust of the world leads to stagnation of the soul.”
He liked it that Tristan was relentless and wasn’t going to let him have the last word. Anderson bit into his sandwich and a newsman’s voice on TV bled into their space:
“…In other news, last night an argument between rival gangs escalated into a shooting at Prospect Vocational High School. One student was rushed to Masonic Hospital in critical condition…”
Anderson shook his head disdainfully at the story.
“They found a gun in a locker at our school.” Tristan contributed nonchalantly.
Anderson stared at her with wide-eyed astonishment.
“It was only blanks.” Tristan added.
“Just blanks!” Anderson said, turning to Karen. “Maybe she should go to a private school.”
“Get me the iPhone, then you won’t have to worry.” Tristan interjected. “They have GPS and everything!”
Karen tossed it all off, distracted by more immediate concerns.
Anderson read Karen’s non-response as a cue that she would rather have the conversation later, away from Tristan. “So, what did you want me to come home for?” He asked.
“Nothing.” Karen replied casually. “I just wanted to remind you we have that wedding on Saturday.”
Anderson groaned. He didn’t care for those things.
“Mom.” Tristan sighed, protesting her mother’s reticence to tell the real reason she wanted him to come home.
“And there are some things the landscapers brought that I didn’t order.” Karen continued.
“Mom!” Tristan turned fixedly on her father. “Dad, these guys outside are really creepy. They were looking at us weird and everything. One of them was trying to look in the window at mom changing her clothes.”
Anderson was already starting for the backyard when Karen hurried in front of him.
“Honey, I don’t know for sure.” Karen’s pleadings gushed forth in a torrent. “You can’t go out there. Please, please, you can’t say anything. I just wanted you to come home so they would see you.” Karen’s upraised hands, braced against his chest, slid to his upper arms where she gripped his shoulders reassuringly. It was only her longstanding ability to smooth out her husband’s rough edges that kept him from charging out the door.
Tom Granger piled out of a pickup with two of his beefiest male employees. Granger was a landscaper who Anderson sub-contracted work out to from time to time. It was Granger who hired Derek, Gabriel and Ruben.
“Tom, you recruiting your workers from a chain gang now?” Anderson fumed, waiting in his driveway for their arrival.
“Sorry, Noel, I hired these guys for the summer. They’re just temporary.” Granger offered apologetically.
Derek, Gabriel and Ruben were lackadaisically laying sod in the backyard under the blare of a boom box spewing classic rock when Anderson stepped up with the others. Granger shut off the music.
Derek and the others immediately stopped their work, looked up.
Anderson lagged only slightly back to blunt the combustible nature of the confrontation, letting Granger and his men “handle things” as they walked into the yard.
“Okay, guys, you’re done here.” Granger announced impatiently. “Go back to the office. There’s other work I need you to do.”
“What is this shit?” Derek stared hard at Anderson who returned his stare. Derek drew back the shovel he was holding, and raged at him. “You fucking asshole!”
“I’m telling you now to pack it up!” Granger shouted. “Go pick up your checks!”
“Cool it, man! Ain’t worth it!” Ruben implored Derek who was irritated to be getting instructions from anyone, least of all Ruben. Ruben was trying to act like the cooler head when he was really just pissing his pants.
Everyone seemed ready to pounce.
Derek was especially spring loaded for action. A few nervous seconds passed before Derek finally threw down the shovel.
“Fuck you! We quit!” Derek hissed, slowly letting the situation deflate on what he felt were his terms. He walked off with a rat’s impudence, bumping the shoulder of one of Granger’s beefy workers, before he locked his gaze on Anderson, spit on the ground, and moved off.
Gabriel acted amused now, and followed his brother’s lead, brushing shoulders with the other burly back-up worker before retreating with Ruben.
Granger threw a contrite look at Anderson and shook his head wearily.
Derek and the dump truck were gone, as was Granger, the pickup and everyone else.
Anderson got into his Mercedes.
Karen leaned in the window.
“I’ll come home early, skip the club thing.” Anderson told her straightforwardly, fully meaning it. Joining a country club hadn’t been his idea anyway. If it were up to him, their social life would comprise Karen, Tristan and himself, that’s it. Karen was the one who wanted them to become members. Anderson had been approached to join over the years by the dads of daughters who went to school with Tristan. Anderson was a man’s man, easy to like even if hard to get close to. Karen had said it would be a good way for them to start integrating into the world around them. Maybe even begin entertaining. Expand their world and Tristan’s. It might be nice. Anyway, they were lowering the initiation fees to virtually nothing in this bad economy to attract members so Anderson was out of excuses.
“Don’t be silly, they’re gone.” Karen replied calmly, without worry, in a way almost like not wanting to have that discussion
again, the one they’d had before regarding his propensity to be hyper-vigilant and obsessive. She wanted those qualities to be remnants of his past. “I appreciate you going tonight. I know you’re doing it for me.”
“It’s for all of us.” He said with a shrug.
She stared at him for a long moment.
“What?” Anderson asked, a bit discomfited by her Sphinx-like stare.
“You’re always so far away. I’ve been chasing you for fifteen years. You have to let me catch you one of these days.” Karen had also said this before, but there was a real tinge of wistfulness this time.
“I’m right here, babe.” Anderson replied, not exactly giving her the answer she was looking for, but she would let it suffice.
“I love you.” Karen said unaffectedly.
“I love you, too.” Anderson replied.
“Not, ‘too’.” She good-naturedly complained as she then kissed him deeply, passionately. She broke off the kiss, drew her head back out of the window and gave him a sexy smile. “Don’t come home too tired.”
Anderson smiled back, eyes narrowed mischievously. He caught her drift. He put the car in gear and backed out.
As he pulled out into the street he noticed Tristan in the living room window.
Tristan held up the flyer, gestured for him to remember the iPhone.
Anderson smiled, waved good-bye and drove off.
CHAPTER 4
Anderson sat at his desk in his office across from Al Ward, a private investigator in his late fifties with a pirate’s demeanor and a gin-blossom complexion.
Joyce, Anderson’s middle-aged secretary, handed Anderson some papers and walked out of his office and back to her desk in the reception area of the unadorned, workmanlike space.
Even Anderson’s office was simply appointed except for a framed photograph of Karen and Tristan along with a drafting board.
“One of my guys has an immigration problem.” Anderson explained as he glanced at the papers to make sure they were what he needed, then held them out for Ward. “Victor Ayala. Work visa expired. Something.”
Violence Page 2
