Can't Get Enough (12 page)

“Barbara, you’ll ruin . . .”

She ignored him and whirled around on her heels. Then she remembered the earrings and stopped. She removed them from her ears, stormed back to the table, and threw them at him. He ducked out of the way then stared at her with eyes wide open. She turned and flew.

Barbara reached the table in the colonnade and grabbed her purse. “Come on, girls,” she said to Robin and Rebecca. “We’re leaving.” Barbara signaled the waiter, planning to pay and cancel the rest of their meal.

“We’ve already done that,” Robin said quietly.

They had known what was coming the minute she had jumped up out of her seat, Barbara realized, because they had seen this scene or others like it countless times over the years. Barbara felt a pang of shame as she marched out of the restaurant with her daughters in tow.

JOLENE AND PATRICK dropped Juliette off at Monica’s house, then drove down to K Street for a night at Georgia Brown’s. Jolene couldn’t have asked for a more romantic setting. It was a perfectly clear evening with a deep blue sky, and this was one of her favorite restaurants. The food was low-country cuisine, with dishes such as fried green tomatoes served in an elegant dining area with high ceilings and sparkling chandeliers.

After a dinner of crab soup and southern fried chicken salad, she and Patrick settled back with crème brûlée and brandy. By the time Jolene ordered a second round of drinks for them, Patrick seemed more relaxed with her than he’d been since they had split up. They talked freely about everything, their conversation drifting from Juliette’s teen behavior to Jolene’s lottery winnings and plans for the future. It was wonderful to have Patrick laughing and agreeing with her for a change instead of arguing.

As Patrick chatted on about his job, Jolene smiled and nodded. Once in a while she leaned over just enough to give him a good look down her low-cut suit jacket. She pretended to sip her brandy but she really just let it grace her lips much of the time. She had ordered a second round to get Patrick loosened up, but she wanted to keep a clear head herself. She had big plans for the two of them later that night.

She touched his leg gently under the table with the toe of her Manolo. It was a light touch, probably barely noticeable, but it let him know that she was available. He smiled at her. Maybe he was finally getting the message.

If all went well, Patrick would wake up in her bed tomorrow morning and many mornings afterward. She would see how Pearl felt about
that
.

Following brandy and dessert, they climbed into Patrick’s Nissan Maxima and chatted and laughed all the way home. When they pulled up in front of Jolene’s house, she gently put her hand on his thigh. “Why don’t you come in for a cup of coffee?”

He nodded in agreement so quickly that it surprised Jolene. She had expected to have to do some persuading, especially since Pearl had called him on his cell phone as they were leaving the restaurant. Maybe things between Patrick and fatso weren’t going so well after all. Or maybe he still found his ex-wife too hard to resist.

She poured them both glasses of sherry instead of coffee, as Patrick unbuttoned his jacket and settled on the couch in the family room. She wanted him to feel that they could get along again as a couple, and the looser Patrick was the easier that would be. She thought if she could just get him into her bed overnight, the rest would come easy.

“Sometimes I wish we could go back,” she said as she sat down beside him.

“Go back where?” he asked as he sipped his drink.

She kicked off her heels and tucked her feet up under her. “To the way things were when we were first married.”

Patrick sighed with nostalgia. “Remember when we brought Juliette home from the hospital?”

Jolene nodded and smiled. “You held her almost all night while I got some rest. Wasn’t that special? What happened to us?”

“Different goals, different needs. You were always more money and power hungry than I was. Although money’s obviously not a problem for you anymore.”

“No it’s not, thank God. But lots of couples disagree about money. It doesn’t mean they have to break up.”

“True. But it’s different if one of them is also screwing the other’s boss.”

Jolene was silent for a moment. He’d said it in a lighthearted way, but still. He
would
have to bring that up. She hit him playfully in an attempt to break the sudden tension in the air. “Don’t go there. I know I screwed up. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

She wasn’t going to remind him that he had cheated on her during the early years of their marriage. He had even fathered a child from the affair, a daughter he’d had nothing to do with until about a year ago. But she couldn’t fault him entirely for that. He hadn’t even known about Lee until she had shown up on their doorstep last summer.

“Neither of us was exactly an angel,” she said. “Let’s leave it at that.”

“If you’re talking about Lee, the affair with her mother was the only time I was unfaithful to you. You were so depressed about losing your first baby and your family rejecting you that I thought our marriage was doomed from the start. But then I decided that it was wrong to get involved with someone else and I broke it off after only a few weeks. I wanted to do everything I could to work things out with you.”

He paused and shook his head. “I was crazy about you then. But nothing I did made you happy. You always wanted more—a bigger house, a fancier car. And that got to me eventually. I guess we’re just not right for each other.”

She touched his arm. “Don’t say that. We were both so young when we got married. I was too immature and stubborn to see how good you were for me. But I’m older and wiser now and I really regret some of the things I did. Men don’t come any better than you, Patrick.” She slid closer to him on the couch until their shoulders touched.

He smiled down at her in appreciation and they sat together silently for a moment. She noticed that his caramel complexion was flushed with alcohol. He didn’t appear to be intoxicated, just very relaxed. She touched his cheek gently. “We get along much better now. Notice?”

“Yes. You know, I still find you very attractive.”

A tingle traveled down her back. “Thank you.”

She placed her glass on the coffee table, then took his glass and set it down. She swung a leg over his thighs and straddled him.

“Jolene, I don’t know about this.”

She ignored his protests and licked his ear with her tongue. He closed his eyes, moaned, and leaned his head back. She knew she had him.

She smothered his face with kisses as she removed his jacket and tossed it onto the floor. She had just reached for the top button to his shirt when a phone rang, piercing the hot and heavy air like a dagger into flesh.

Jolene jumped. “Where the hell is that coming from?”

Patrick pushed her off his lap and back onto the couch and grabbed his jacket off the floor. He reached into the inside pocket and pulled out his cell phone.

“Yeah,” he muttered into the receiver.

Jolene exhaled with frustration as she straightened her suit jacket. She crossed her ankles and listened.

“Hey,” Patrick said softly. “No. I shouldn’t be much longer. Will you still be there?”

Jolene rolled her eyes to the ceiling. That was Pearl, no doubt. Who did she think she was, calling and checking up on him every fucking five minutes? Meddlesome cow.

“Mm-hmm,” Patrick said glancing at his watch. “About ten minutes?”

Dammit. What the hell was he talking about? Ten minutes? They needed
way
more time than that.

Jolene crossed her legs at the knees and bounced her foot up and down. It was all she could do to keep from yelling at Patrick. She couldn’t stand being ignored, especially when she was horny.

“OK. I’ll see you then, baby.”

This was too much, Jolene thought as she hastily brushed imaginary lint off her jacket. Now he was calling Pearl “baby.” She ought to yank the goddamn phone out of his hand. How dare he carry on like that in front of her.

Patrick said good-bye and hung up. He glanced at Jolene out of the corner of his eye. “Sorry about that.”

“Pfft. Why does she have to call you all the time?”

“She’s at the house with Lee. I told her I would be back by ten o’clock and it’s after eleven.”

“So now she’s got you on curfew?” Jolene said sarcastically.

“Don’t be silly. She’s just wondering how much longer I’ll be.”

All damn night if I have my way, Jolene thought. “Let’s not talk about her now,” Jolene said. “I don’t want to argue. Where were we before we got interrupted?” She threw her leg back over him, but he grabbed her by the waist and sat her back firmly on the couch.

“What’s wrong?”

“I really need to go.” He stood up, slipped his arms into his jacket, and placed his cell phone back in the pocket.

Jolene stared at him. She was flabbergasted. “You’re leaving?
Now?
”

He smiled down at her. “I’m afraid so.”

Shit. He was leaving her to go to Pearl? Un-fucking-believable. But she had to stay calm. She had to strategize if she wanted to win Patrick back. She still believed there was a chance and she wasn’t going to give up yet. It was just going to take more work than she had thought.

She stood and straightened her suit. “Well, I’m real disappointed that we were interrupted and now you have to run off. I mean, we were just getting started.”

“I’m sorry. I . . . we should never have let things get as far as they did. I don’t know what came over me, or you, for that matter.”

She grabbed the lapels of his jacket. “Well,
I
know what came over us. You wanted me, Patrick. I could feel it.”

“I won’t deny that I still find you attractive, Jolene. I already said that. But I doubt things would ever work out between us. We’re too different.”

“Differences are good for a relationship. They keep it exciting.”

He chuckled uncomfortably and gently removed her hands from his lapels. “Sometimes maybe a little
too
exciting for me.”

She grabbed his lapels again. “Patrick, please. Listen to me, honey. I’ve changed, and I really miss you. Juliette does, too, and I know you miss her.”

A look of sadness came over Patrick’s face at the mention of Juliette. “That is my biggest regret about things not working out between us.”

“Then come back to us, Patrick. Come home.”

He sighed. “It’s not that simple, Jo.”

“Isn’t it? We were a family before. We can be a family again. All you have to do is move back in with us. Only this time, things will be a lot better. We won’t have financial problems like before. Think of all the things we can do with the money I won. Think of Juliette.”

He took her hands and cupped them in his own, and Jolene’s heart pumped faster.

“I don’t know, Jo. And I don’t want you getting your hopes up and especially Juliette’s if things don’t work out.”

If things don’t work out? That meant he was thinking about it and that maybe things
could
work out. She had to reassure him about Juliette. “I wouldn’t tell her about us unless it was a sure thing. You know I would never intentionally do anything to hurt her.”

He nodded. “If there is one thing I’ve always admired about you, it’s that you’re a damn good mother to my daughter. The best.” He squeezed her hands.

She smiled. “Thank you.”

“OK. Maybe I’ll come by in a couple of weeks, one day after work, and we can talk more. I’ll call to make sure Juliette will be around.”

“I’ll do my best to make sure she is,” Jolene said sweetly. If anything, she was going to make sure Juliette was
not
around.

“Good,” he said. “But no promises. Understood? We’re just talking at this point.”

“Right. Just talking.” Jolene smiled sweetly as she walked him to the front door. With any luck, the end of the next date would turn out a lot better than this one. She didn’t care if she had to lie, connive, and cheat, she was going to get her man back from that bitch.

PEARL TAPPED HER foot as she sat on the couch in Patrick’s house and flipped through the pages of Jet. She sighed deeply, closed the magazine, and dropped it on the glass coffee table. She placed her hands in her lap. She felt silly sitting in that position, so she picked up the magazine and flipped through it again.

She looked up. She wasn’t seeing any of the pages, not really. She couldn’t stop worrying about Patrick and when he was going to get back. She glanced at her watch. It had been ten minutes, no, more like fifteen, since she had called over to Jolene’s place and Patrick said he was on his way home. And Jolene lived less than half a mile away.

Pearl dropped the magazine back on the coffee table. She was acting like a jealous fool. Patrick had every right to have dinner with his baby’s mama. So why was she behaving like this?

Perhaps because his child’s mama was Jolene Brown, and Pearl didn’t trust that woman at all. They had never gotten along and never would.

If all that wasn’t enough, Jolene was also a big flirt. She walked around looking and acting like an expensively dressed whore, always wearing low-cut tops with her boobs hanging out. Not to mention all that fake hair and makeup.

Still, Pearl knew that she had to trust Patrick if this relationship was going to work. She
did
trust Patrick. She just had to remind herself of that every now and then. She picked up the remote control from the coffee table, turned the television on, and flipped through the channels. She soon realized she was doing the same thing with the television that she had been doing with the magazine—not paying attention. Was there any hope for her?

She was placing the remote on the coffee table when she heard the front door open and shut. It was about time. She jumped up just as Patrick walked into the living room.

“Sorry about that,” Patrick said as he brushed her cheek with a kiss.

“That’s all right,” Pearl said, waving her hand in an effort to sound nonchalant. “So how was dinner?”

“It was fine.”

“Where did you go?”

“Georgia Brown’s.”

“Oh?” They had driven
that
far together? “Where is Juliette? I thought she was coming back home with you.”

He moved toward the couch and unbuttoned his gray blazer. “Juliette didn’t go to dinner with us. She was invited to a sleepover at one of her girlfriend’s at the last minute.”

“Oh,” Pearl said. Her heart began to pound a little faster. So he and Jolene had driven all the way into town for dinner alone. Pearl didn’t like the sound of that. “And, um, how is Jolene?”

“Good, good.” He stretched his legs. “So, what did you do for dinner?” There was something about the way he quickly changed the subject that didn’t sit right with Pearl. His answers to her questions were short, almost curt. But she didn’t want to think about that now. It was probably just her imagination.

“I ate at home and then I came over here about nine-thirty, since you said you would be back by ten.”

He nodded.

Lordy, Pearl thought. The short blunt responses had turned into no response. She sighed and glanced at her watch. “It’s almost midnight and I have to open the salon for an appointment at nine. I should get going.”

He stood up. “Fine. Is Lee asleep?”

Pearl blinked as she stood. In the past he had always tried to talk her into staying overnight. Something was definitely different. “She’s in her room. She was on the phone the last time I was up there.”

“I see.” Patrick took Pearl’s arm. “I’ll walk you to your car.”

Pearl smiled stiffly. “Thank you.”

There was an odd sound in the air as she picked her shoulder bag up off the stuffed armchair. They walked out the front door and down to the curb. By the time they reached her minivan, she knew what the odd sound was. Silence. In all the months they had been dating, Pearl could never remember such a lengthy silence between them.

He opened the door to the minivan for her and shut it after she climbed in. She rolled down the window slowly and awkwardly, since the little round knob had broken off, and inserted the key into the ignition.

He leaned down and smiled at her through the window. “When are you going to get around to replacing this old clunker?”

So that was how it was? He was spending all his time with his millionaire ex-wife eating at fancy restaurants, and now her van was a clunker. “When I get the money,” she said curtly.

His head jerked back. “Sorry. I was only teasing.”

Her comment wasn’t really fair, she thought. He had been bugging her to replace the minivan for months. “I know,” she said. “I’m just tired I guess.” She was more upset than tired, but she didn’t want to show it. She needed to get away and think. “I’m going now.”

He stood up abruptly. “I’ll call you tomorrow, OK?”

She blinked, startled that he hadn’t kissed her good-bye as usual, and rolled the window back up. She pulled off and looked into the rearview mirror, expecting to see him standing there in the driveway waving at her like he always did. But he was gone.

She hit the steering wheel with her fist. Darn it! He’d slept with her. She
knew
it. The air was thick with something fishy. That had to be it.

Patrick and Jolene driving into town together and dining all alone. Patrick and Jolene going back to Jolene’s place all alone. Patrick acting stiff and distant with her. She could put two and two together. Jolene had seduced him.

She pulled the minivan over to the curb and put it in park. She put her hand on her chest and tried to regulate the pace of her breathing. In, out. Slowly.

After her divorce, Pearl had dropped out of the social scene for years and focused on raising Kenyatta. She hadn’t wanted the distraction of a man keeping her from doing a good job of raising her son. Then one day she looked up and Kenyatta was an adult waving good-bye, and Patrick was smiling down at her.

She weighed even more back then than she did now, and she couldn’t believe that this successful, good-looking man was interested in her chubby self. But he was still married to Jolene then, even if they were separated, and for a while Pearl kept turning him away. He kept calling and stopping by the salon, making her laugh with his wry sense of humor, and eventually she’d given in and gone out with him. They had been a couple ever since.

Now it looked like his ex-wife wanted him back.

Pearl tightened her lips with determination. She banged her fists on the steering wheel. Dammit! Ms. Thang wasn’t going to get him back without a fight. When her ex-husband had started messing around with his young white secretary all those years ago, she had given him up without so much as a whimper. That wasn’t going to happen with Patrick. This time she was going to fight for her man.

She swung the minivan around and pointed it back toward Patrick’s house.

“DID YOU FORGET something?” Patrick asked when he opened the front door and saw her standing there.

Pearl entered and turned to face him. “Actually, it was
you
who forgot something,” she said, her hands planted firmly on her hips.

He knitted his brow, obviously puzzled, as he shut the door. “Me? What?”

“This.” She reached out, pulled him close, and kissed him on the lips.