At Peace (28 page)

“Not as much as me, sounds so good, baby,
this I’d like to see.”

I didn’t reply, just pressed and rolled my
finger and ground my hips into it.

“Next time you’re in my bed, you do this for
me,” he told me.

“I don’t think –”

He cut me off to order, “Slide your finger
inside.”

“I like what I’m doin’.”

“Do what I say, Violet, slide your finger
inside.”

I stopped rolling and slid my finger inside.
It wasn’t the first time I’d done it but it had been a long time
and it felt nice.

“How wet are you?” Joe asked.

“Very.”

“Christ, I miss that cunt of yours,” he
growled.

“Joe,” I breathed, feeling myself spasm at
his growl.

“Make yourself come, baby.”

“Okay,” I whispered.

He talked me through it and I came, not loud,
quiet, but it felt good and he heard.

After, I slid my hand out of my panties,
pulled my skirt down and rolled to my side, curling my legs up and
feeling strangely that this was one of the most intimate things
that had passed between us and he was most of a continent away.

“
When’re you comin’ home?” I asked
softly.

“Soon, doublin’ up on meetings, I should be
home by Saturday.”

“Good,” I whispered.

“How’re you feelin’?”

I smiled into my pillow and answered quietly,
“Nice.”

“Right now, I’d like to lick your fingers
clean.” Another mew slid from my throat and when it did he growled
again, this time unintelligibly.

“Mom!” I heard Keira screech, my body jerked
on the bed and I sat upright.

“What the fuck?” Joe asked in my ear.

“Mom!” Keira screeched again, this time
closer.

“
Oh my
God!
” Kate yelled.

“Oh God, Joe,” I threw my legs off the bed
and started running to the door.

“Call Colt,” Joe ordered urgently.

“Okay.”

“Now, buddy, right now.”

“Okay,” I slid my phone shut and threw open
my door.

Keira was outside the door, her hand lifted
toward the knob.

“Mom!” she shrieked in my face.

“What, baby, what?”

“The door… she’s at the door.”

She?

I looked into the living room to see both
Kate and Dane at the window staring out.

Kate looked at me and breathed, “Oh my
God.”

I couldn’t hear her, I just read her
lips.

“Come away from the window,” I ordered as I
rushed to it but they didn’t move so I got in front of Kate and
looked out.

Then I breathed, “Oh my God.”

Kenzie Elise was standing at the door. She
was wearing a drapey, ripped up, sleeveless t-shirt that looked
like it cost more than my couch, skinny jeans and high-heeled
platform, shiny taupe pumps. Her long mane of strawberry blonde
hair was out to
there
and she
had more makeup on than I wore on my date with Mike.

“Do you think she’s got the wrong house and
is lookin’ for Mr. Callahan?” Dane suggested.

She didn’t have the wrong house but that
didn’t mean she wasn’t looking for Joe.

I watched her lift her hand and press the
buzzer and I guessed, by the irate way she did it, it wasn’t the
first time. In a perfect world, I would be in the position to ask
Joe to install a doorbell that was louder, say, one you could hear
while you were having phone sex.

She turned and her eyes fell on us at the
window and she didn’t look happy when she’d turned and she looked
less happy when she spied us.

I jumped away from the window and went to the
door.

“If she’s lookin’ for Joe, tell her he joined
the Peace Corps,” Keira advised quickly, she’d surmised the
situation and clearly wanted to run interference on Kenzie’s bid
for Joe, making certain I had a clean go.

I gave my daughter a look, hit the necessary
buttons on the alarm panel and then opened the door.

When I did, Kenzie looked down her nose at
me. She actually tilted her eyes, not her head, to stare down her
nose at me from her towering height in her platform heels.

“Hey there,” I said, like she or any other
famous movie star came to my door every day and like the last time
I saw her she wasn’t practically naked and crawling around on the
floor.

“Is Cal here?” she asked.

Damn. I knew she was looking for Joe.

“No, he’s in LA,” I told her.

“
How do you know where Joe is?” Keira asked
and I looked behind me to see Keira, Kate
and
Dane had all gathered close to my back. Keira was
staring at me; Kate and Dane were staring at Kenzie.

“He told me,” I said to Keira.

“When?” Keira asked.

I would have paid money at that moment to
have a less astute daughter.

“She calls him Joe?” Kenzie interrupted us
with her question and I looked back at her because she sounded kind
of pissed and when I looked at her she was glaring at Keira.

“Yeah, we all call him Joe,” Keira shared.
“Or, at least, Mom, Kate and me do. Dane calls him Mr.
Callahan.”

Kenzie’s eyes came to me and I was right, she
was pissed.

“He doesn’t let anyone call him Joe.”

I opened my mouth to speak but Keira got
there before I could.

“
He let
s us call him Joe, he likes it.”

I wracked my brain for a way to intervene and
stupidly offered, “Would you like to come in, have a pop or a
beer?”

She stared daggers at me and announced, “We
need to talk.”

I didn’t know what she wanted to talk
about, though I did know, whatever it was,
I
didn’t want to talk about it but I couldn’t exactly shut
the door in her face in front of the kids because they didn’t know
anything about anything and I didn’t want them to.

Therefore, I invited, “Okay, come in,” then I
stepped out of the way.

Her eyes swept Kate, Dane and Keira then they
came back to me.

“Alone.”

I looked into my house. There wasn’t much
alone space in my house unless I took her to a bedroom which I
wasn’t going to do.

Then I saw the sliding glass door to the
deck. It was a nice night, not muggy, fresh and warm. The deck was
perfect.

“We’ll go sit on the deck,” I told her and
swung my arm out, showing the way. She sashayed in, all leg (or,
more aptly, bony leg) and swaying hips and she walked through my
house as if prolonged exposure to the air the girls and I breathed
would contaminate her.

I walked behind her and ordered the kids, “Go
back to your movie.”

“Mom –” Keira started.

“Come on, Keirry, let’s finish the movie,”
Kate urged, her eyes on me, she grabbed her sister and started
pulling her to the couch.

I threw my eldest a smile, saying a silent
prayer to God in thanks he gave me one sane daughter and hustled
behind Kenzie.

She pulled the door open herself and
walked out, her pumps sounding on the wood of my deck as she headed
straight to the wrought iron furniture Tim had bought me at an end
of season sale three years ago. The furniture was fantastic, a
circular table, wide, comfy chairs that rocked and a big umbrella.
There were also two loungers. All of these had elegant, tailored
gray pads on them.

She dumped her big, slouchy, designer handbag
on the table without looking at me or my garden and started digging
through it.

I closed the sliding glass door and
approached her, stopping out of distance of her nails.

She pulled out a gold case, selected a
cigarette, dropped the case back in her purse and put the cigarette
to her lips, lighting it with an elegant, slim, gold lighter.

Then she let out of a plume of smoke and
stared out at my lawn.

Without anything to say to her, I looked
around my deck.

If I wasn’t at the garden center, at the
grocery store, doing laundry, ironing, cooking, cleaning house,
buying expensive dog food and water bowls, sleeping with Joe or
just plain sleeping, I was in my yard.

My boss Bobbie gave great employee discounts
and I took advantage as much as I could on our tight budget. I’d
used some of the money my brother gave me to augment this but most
of that I tucked away for a rainy day. But, even if I said so
myself, I didn’t do half bad with my yard.

The front of the house had window boxes on
all of the windows stuffed full of flowers bursting out and
greenery trailing down. I had sections of split rail fence at one
side of my drive and another where the drive met the front walk
that ran from the drive parallel to the house. I’d planted lush,
tall grasses around the fences with low to the ground flowers that
had filled in beautifully in the Indiana soil. I had a burgeoning
hanging basket by the front door and the front walk was lined with
vibrant, healthy bedding plants. It looked great.

The back was better. The lawn was just lawn
but I’d fertilized it and put weed killer on it and it looked
brilliant, rich green, thick and lush. But it was the deck that was
the show stopper with its posh furniture. I’d bought bunches of
terracotta pots in every size and they were everywhere, stuffed
full of flowers of all colors and varieties. It appeared random but
I spent ages fiddling with them until I liked what I saw.

And it looked beautiful. I had a way with
flowers, always did. I had a part-time job in a florist shop before
Tim died because I loved flowers. And Bobbie let me do the displays
at the garden center and everyone was talking about them. I even
had a customer come up to me the week before and offer to pay me to
have a look at her garden, said she was hopeless and needed garden
direction. I was going to her house on my day off next week.

“You fucking Cal?”

I started and my eyes jerked to Kenzie when
she spoke.

I didn’t know what to say. Her question was
nosy and rude and more than a little psycho, considering Joe had
made it perfectly clear in a way that couldn’t possibly be ignored
that this kind of information was none of her business.

And why was she there, considering Joe had
made it perfectly clear in a way that couldn’t possibly be ignored
that her infiltration into his life was not welcome?

And anyway, I had kids in the house. Was she
nuts?

I looked back at the house and through the
sliding glass doors. The kids didn’t have their faces pressed to
the glass which was good and I hoped they couldn’t hear.

“You’re fucking him,” Kenzie went on and I
looked at her again.

“Would you mind telling me why you’re here?”
I asked.

She had one arm crossed at her ribs, her
other elbow resting on her wrist and her cigarette hand in the air.
She swung her hand to her face, took a drag then swung her hand out
as she exhaled the smoke.

Then she looked me top to toe.

“What’s his deal?” she asked though I didn’t
think she was asking me even if I was the only one there and I
found I was right when she went on. “You’re fat.”

I felt my body go solid.

I was not fat. Okay, so, I wasn’t thin nor
was I rail thin and emaciated like her but I couldn’t be described
as fat.

“I’m not fat,” I stated.

She sneered and took another drag off her
cigarette.

I’d had enough. In fact, I should have
slammed the door in her face.

“Listen, if I can’t help you with something,
maybe you’d like to –”

“Vi?”

I twisted around and saw Colt standing at the
end of my deck looking at us.

“Hey Colt,” I called.

His eyes moved to Kenzie, I saw his face
register recognition but that was it then his eyes came straight
back to me.

“You okay?” he asked, walking down the deck
toward the steps and I saw he had his badge on the belt of his
jeans.

“I’m fine,” I told him as he jogged up the
steps. “I just –”

“Hi there,” Kenzie breathed and I swung my
head around to look at her to see she was gazing at Colt like he
was a hot fudge sundae with tons of whipped cream, nuts and a
cherry.

“Hey,” he replied, barely glancing at her and
his eyes came to me. “Cal called, said the girls were
screamin’?”

Joe had called Colt for me. My stomach did a
little flip.

“Um… they were a little excited about a movie
star bein’ at the door.”

Colt’s eyes sliced through Kenzie again then
they came back to me.

“You better call Cal. He’s worried it was
somethin’ to do with your thing,” Colt told me.

He was worried about me. My stomach did
another little flip.

“I’m Kenzie Elise,” Kenzie butted in and I
looked at her again.

“
I know who you are, found out about ten
minutes ago you keep callin’ Vi’s house,” Colt said to her, my
mouth dropped open at this news and I stared at Kenzie realizing
she
was
nuts. “Gonna
have to ask you to stop doin’ that,” Colt went on.

“You have my number?” I asked but she ignored
me, her eyes glued to Colt.

“I’m looking for Cal,” Kenzie told Colt.

“How did you get my number?” I asked but she
didn’t answer because Colt spoke.

“You want to talk to him, you call his girl.
You don’t call Vi’s house and hang up.”

His girl? What girl? Joe had a girl?

I forgot about finding out how Kenzie got my
number, the more pressing matter at hand was Joe having a
“girl”.

“Lindy won’t give him my messages,” Kenzie
said to Colt.

“I’ll let Cal know his secretary is fallin’
down on the job.”

Joe had a secretary?

Joe stayed in hotels with valet parking and
had a secretary?

“Now unless you have some business with
Violet, might be a good idea you move along,” Colt ordered but did
it in a way that sounded like a suggestion except it was a
suggestion you couldn’t exactly deny. Kenzie denied it. “It’s
important I speak to him.”