Bunco Babes Tell All

by Maria Geraci

  He muttered something under his breath and shook his head.

  Kitty laughed and laid her head back on the seat. The rest of the drive was spent in comfortable small talk. It was the first time she’d been with Steve that she hadn’t felt slightly on edge.

  They drove into Mexico Beach, where he pulled the truck into the private driveway of a two-story Tuscan-style house directly on the beach. A For Sale sign was posted on the well-manicured lawn. There was a car in the driveway and a woman standing next to it.

  Kitty straightened to attention. “What’s this?”

  “We’re going to hang out here for a few hours.” He killed the engine and eyed her. “That okay?”

  Kitty inspected the house. The red-tiled roof contrasted brightly against the waning early evening sky. Purple bougainvillea vines accented the columns leading to a dark mahogany-wood door.

  Okay? The place was gorgeous.

  “I think I could tolerate a few hours here,” she said.

  The woman came forward to greet them. She was young, with straight blonde hair that fell to her waist. A pair of sunglasses rested on top of her head. She wore a crisp, sleeveless white shirt and a beige cotton skirt that fell a few inches above her knee. It must have been ninety-five degrees outside, but her makeup was still impeccable. Kitty immediately hated her.

  “You must be Steve Pappas. I’ve heard a lot about you,” said the blonde, extending her French-manicured hand. “I’m Caroline Estes. But everyone calls me Caro. I’m new with the company.”

  He shook her hand. “Thanks for meeting me out here on such short notice.”

  “Anytime.” She eyed him up and down like he was a prize filet and she was a butcher. “I hear you’re an avid fisherman.”

  “I try.”

  “I think you’ll find the waters around here pretty friendly.”

  Kitty couldn’t help the choking sound that came out of her mouth.

  Caro finally noticed her. Her big blue eyes widened at the sight of Kitty’s flip-flops and still-damp hair. “And, you are?”

  “Sorry, I should have introduced you. This is Katherine Burke.” Steve paused. “My Realtor.”

  Caro looked confused. “But I thought—”

  “She’s looking at property in Whispering Bay for me,” Steve said without missing a beat.

  Kitty blinked and tried not to give anything away with her expression. She wondered if this was how Bonnie felt when she and Clyde had walked into a bank right before robbing it.

  “Oh,” Caro said, smiling with regained composure. She took a small leopard-skin case from her purse and handed Kitty a business card. “What company are you with?”

  Kitty glanced at the card. Malibu Barbie was a Realtor? She wondered if Walt Walters had sniffed her out yet.

  “Actually, I’m a broker. I work for myself. I’m afraid I don’t have my cards with me.” Ha. As if she’d have given Caro one of her Help me help you cards, anyway.

  “No problem. I’m sure I can reach you if I need to,” she said to Kitty, but her gaze was glued on Steve. Subtlety was obviously not one of Caro’s strong points. “I had no idea there was anything . . . exciting going on in Whispering Bay.”

  “You’d be surprised,” Kitty said, trying to keep from yanking out a chunk of Caro’s golden hair. Surely it wasn’t natural. Neither the color nor the hair itself. Kitty searched (discreetly, of course) for the telltale extension line.

  Caro pulled a set of keys from her purse and handed them to Steve, along with one of her business cards. “I can be reached twenty-four-seven.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Anytime,” she said. “Just call when you want me to pick up the keys.”

  “I’ll drop them off at your office.” There was a finite ring to his tone. A subtle dismissal at which Kitty couldn’t help but cringe. She wondered if Caro would notice.

  “Sure,” Caro said, her shoulders slumped. Malibu Barbie wasn’t so dense after all. Kitty almost felt sorry for her. The key word being almost.

  She waited till Caro’s car was out of sight. “Does she think you’re interested in buying this place? And why on earth would she leave you the keys?”

  “My natural charm?”

  “This is a multimillion-dollar house. No one is that charming. What we’re doing is verging on the illegal. You’re misrepresenting yourself to that poor girl.”

  “Let me worry about that.”

  She should demand they get back in the truck and leave. That’s what she should do. But the truth was she didn’t want to. There was something incredibly exciting about having a non-date in a house you had conned your way into.

  What the hell was happening to her?

  Steve opened the front door. Kitty had been a Realtor long enough to have developed a decent poker face, but this was too much. “Oh my God,” she said, trying not to laugh.

  22

  A large gold mirror, adorned at the corners with two cherubs aiming arrows at one another, hung above a glass table in the foyer. A black-and-white zebra-striped sectional sat in the center of the living room where a rhinoceros head gazed down from the top of the stone fireplace. The room was accented in lots of gold and strong pinks. It was a mixture of Victoria’s Secret meets Versailles meets the Serengeti.

  “At least it’s air-conditioned,” said Kitty.

  Steve stood in the middle of the living room and shook his head in disgust. She followed him as he walked through the rest of the downstairs, into a large study with a big oak desk, a master bedroom and bath, and finally into the kitchen. With the exception of the foyer and the living room, the rest of the house was tastefully decorated. The kitchen was painted a rich gold color. Copper light fixtures and stone countertops complemented the Mediterranean feel. There were lots of shiny silver kitchen appliances that screamed, “only serious cooking here, please.” He placed the food on the counter and began opening drawers, taking out equipment.

  “Weird, huh?” she said. “It’s like the entrance to the house was decorated for shock value.”

  He laid the contents of the bag onto the kitchen counter and began furiously dicing the onion.

  “Something wrong?” she asked.

  “Nope.”

  She sighed. “Are you going to get all moody on me again? ’Cuz if you are—”

  He looked up, surprised. “Sorry. I was just a little . . . taken aback by all that out there.” He took two beers from the refrigerator with a familiarity that made her eyes narrow, screwed off the caps, and handed her a bottle. “You think I’m moody?”

  “Um, yeah.” She took a sip of her beer. “You’ve been in this house before.” She tried not to make it sound like an accusation.

  He shrugged. “I helped build it.”

  “So you know the owner?”

  “Yeah.” He selected a large skillet from an overhead rack and splashed olive oil in the bottom.

  A part of her felt like she’d been had, but it was a relief to discover they weren’t crashing some random house. Caro’s leaving him the keys made sense now.

  “How long has the house been on the market?”

  “Too long.”

  “The front rooms are hideous, but that’s easily solved. It’s a gorgeous house.”

  “What do you like about it? Besides the location. That’s a given.”

  “The exterior is beautiful. I feel like I’ve been transported to southern Italy.”

  He nodded, urging her on.

  “I can’t comment on the upstairs, since I haven’t seen it yet.” She paused, thinking how to put it best. “I like the way the house is laid out. A lot of people make beach houses too narrow because they’re trying to save land. But this is a house someone would really live in. Not the type of house you’d use just for vacation or to rent out. Take the study. Someone really works in it. And this kitchen,” she added, waving a hand in the air, “the owner of this kitchen can really cook. Or at least they like to pretend they can.”

  He smiled at that last par
t. “The house hasn’t sold because the asking price is too high.”

  “How much?”

  “Four million.”

  “Yikes.”

  “The owner’s stubborn. But eventually they’ll have no choice but to lower the price. Then the place will sell and Caro’s company will make a nice fat commission. Like I said, I’m not worried about her.”

  “Good, then neither am I.”

  He went back to his dicing, but he seemed more relaxed now.

  “Where did you learn to cook?”

  “My mother died when I was fourteen. My older sister was already married and out of the house, so it was just me and the old man. He worked sixty, seventy hours a week. I learned to do just about everything to keep a house together.”

  “Like laundry?”

  “Yeah, like laundry,” he said with no hint of sarcasm. Kitty felt that last vestige of tension between them ebb away. It looked like the Thong Incident was a thing of the past.

  She thought about what it would be like to lose a parent. Fourteen seemed a terrible age. But then, there was probably no good age for that. “Is that why you dropped out of high school? To help out at home?”

  “I dropped out of high school because I was an idiot.” He paused from his chopping. “Figuratively, not literally.”

  She smiled.

  “After my mom died my old man drowned himself in work. I started smoking dope and cutting classes. I thought I knew more at sixteen than he did at fifty.”

  “Where’s your dad now? Still in Cocoa Beach?”

  “Nah. He lives in a retirement community near St. Pete about ten minutes from my sister.”

  “Is he a plumber, like Gus?”

  “Electrician.” He took a bundle of plastic-wrapped chicken breasts out of the cooler and patted them dry with a paper towel. “How about you? Did you graduate from college?” Before she could answer, he said, “Let me guess. You were the valedictorian of your high school class and you majored in . . . finance.”

  “Finance.” She laughed. “That’s a good one.”

  “Was I right about the valedictorian part?”

  “There were only ninety-four kids in my high school graduating class, so it wasn’t that big a deal. And I majored in marketing.”

  “I wouldn’t have guessed that.”

  She raised her brows.

  “ ‘Help me help you find the house of your dreams’?”

  She sniffed. “For your information, that tagline has gotten me a lot of business.”

  “If you say so.”

  “Just because business isn’t exactly hopping right now doesn’t mean I haven’t been successful in the past.”

  “I didn’t say you weren’t successful, but it wasn’t because of that tagline. I can see how someone would want to buy a house from you.” He stopped what he was doing to give her a slow perusal. “You’re attractive, smart, not too aggressive. And most important, you know how to push the right buttons.”

  She felt herself flush. “What do you mean?”

  “Look at Caro. She’s attractive, probably smart, but she’s way too aggressive. She’s working on the wrong buttons.”

  Kitty’s heart began to pound. “Really? I hadn’t noticed.”

  He locked gazes with her. “Yeah, you did.”

  Neither of them looked away for a long time. Finally, Kitty had to back down. It was either that or jump him right there in the kitchen. Considering he was working over a hot stove, the latter wasn’t a safe choice.

  “Maybe I did notice her flirting with you. Just a little,” she admitted, feeling her face go even hotter. “So, um, what are the right buttons?”

  He took a long drag of his beer. “I’ll let you figure that out.”

  She cleared her throat. Maybe it was best to change the subject. “How’s Nathan?”

  “He’s cooled down some,” Steve said, placing the chicken breasts in the skillet. “I’m going to let him and his mom duke it out. Meanwhile, he’s going to hang out at the beach and figure out the meaning of life, that sort of thing.”

  “When he does, let me know. I’ve been trying to do that for thirty-five years.”

  “Joey tells me you’ve never been married. Just never met the right guy?”

  “Something like that.” She sipped her beer and watched as he expertly maneuvered the pan over the hot stove with the flick of his wrist. “What did Joey think about us?”

  He glanced at her. “I didn’t ask him. Do you care what he thinks?”

  A few days ago she would have said yes. It was natural to worry about what other people said behind your back. Especially a big mouth like Joey. Surprisingly, right now she couldn’t care less what Joey thought. But she did care what Gus thought. She wasn’t that evolved. “Does Gus know about the other night?”

  “Not from me.”

  “I didn’t mean to imply that you’d actually tell him.” Maybe she should change the subject again. “Tell me about your first wife, the stripper.”

  She didn’t expect him to answer, so it surprised her when he said, “That really rattled you. Didn’t it?”

  “You meant it to.”

  He ignored her barb. “What do your friends think of me?”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” she said, trying to sound innocent.

  “You give them the lowdown on our night together and they had no comment other than they thought I was some sort of underwear thief?”

  Busted.

  “Okay, I told them you’ve been married three times and they think you’re a loser.”

  Instead of looking offended, he laughed. “What do you think?”

  “I think you’ve made some mistakes in the past.”

  “And I don’t plan on making a fourth one.”

  “Good, because I don’t plan on being the fourth one.”

  “Glad we got that out of the way.”

  “Don’t worry. You’re not my type.”

  He grinned, like he didn’t believe her.

  “Well, you’re my type for that,” she said, flustered. Why did he keep looking at her like she was naked or something? She fiddled with the neckline to her shirt. “But you’re not the type of guy I’d go for in a long-term relationship.”

  “What kind of guy is that? Just out of curiosity’s sake.”

  “Preferably one who hasn’t been married before, but at my age, I know that might be hard to find, so one divorce would be okay, but multiple divorces? Well, no offense, but if you haven’t gotten it right after a couple of tries, you’re pretty much doomed in the marriage department.”

  “No offense taken.” He began cleaning off the counter, tossing away garbage. “You still want to know about my first wife?”

  “Sure.” She tried not to sound too eager, but for some reason, she really did want to know.

  “I was eighteen with no high school degree, working whatever construction jobs I could find, getting drunk every night with my buddies. Then one night, I walked into a strip joint and met the woman of my dreams.”

  She snorted.

  “What can I say? I was horny. And stupid. Plus, it royally pissed off my old man, which back then was an added bonus. The marriage lasted about a month. It was a real wake-up call for me. After that, I got my GED and joined the army.”

  “You were in the army?”

  “Special Forces. Don’t mess with me, or I might have to kill you.”

  She laughed.

  “That’s where I met Sarah, wife number two.”

  “She was in the army?”

  “Yeah. She was a nurse.”

  “What happened there?”

  He shrugged. “Not much to tell. We were stationed in Germany together and it seemed like a good idea at the time. After a couple of years, she wanted kids. I wasn’t ready and she got tired of waiting. I don’t blame her. I was a crummy husband and still not very smart when it came to women.”

  Crummy husband. She wondered what sort of criteria he based that on.

 
; “What about Terrie?”

  “Terrie was my payback for Sarah. If you believe in karma, that is.” He drank down his beer. “I got out of the army and started working construction. After a couple of years I got my contractor’s license and I joined up with an army pal of mine, Dave Hernandez, to form our own company. Terrie worked in real estate. She was divorced so she knew all about past failed relationships and we hooked up. That seemed like a good idea too. But it wasn’t.”

  “How did Nathan take your divorce?”

  The question seemed to surprise him. “Okay, I guess. I thought he and I were buddies, until the attitude he gave me at the bus station the other day.”

  “So the two of you stayed in touch then?”

  He frowned. “Sure. I mean, sort of.”

  Men. They were so obtuse.

  She sighed. “What happened to your company?”

  He hesitated before answering. “Dave and I parted ways.”

  She got the feeling there was more to the story. But she didn’t want to press him. He’d already opened up a lot more than she’d expected. “I’m sorry.”

  “Shit happens.”

  He said it so sheepishly, she had to laugh. It was strange, being in this beautiful house, watching Steve cook and talk about his ex-wives. She looked out the window above the sink facing the Gulf. This morning she’d been in another house just a few miles down the beach helping cement the deal that was going to save her ass. Financially, that is.

  He opened the can of tomato paste and added it and some water to the skillet. Using a dish towel for a pot holder, he gave the whole thing another shake, then turned the knob to lower the heat. “You’re in a good mood,” he said.

  His comment startled her. He couldn’t know her well enough to gauge her moods. “Maybe I’m in a good mood because I’m having a good time.”

  “Maybe.” He tipped his head in the direction of the patio. “This chicken needs to simmer about thirty minutes. Grab the wine and let’s head outside.”

  It was dark now, but the recessed lighting along the edges of the wooden deck provided a soft illumination. Kitty leaned against the railing and watched as Steve opened the wine and poured out two glasses. A gentle breeze lifted the hair off her shoulders. Add in the sound of the waves lapping against the shore and the smell of salt in the air and the scenario was ridiculously intimate. He couldn’t have set up a more romantic scene if he’d tried.