Kicks for a Sinner S3 (31 page)

Joe handed his cell phone to his bathing beauty. She held it carefully above the bubbles as she scanned the list of names. “You know, you could erase some of these women now. This the one?”

“That’s him. I didn’t want to keep all those names, but they transferred them over when I got the new phone.”

“Remind me to show you how to delete after we’re through here.” Nell punched the number, and the signal winged directly to the source.

“Yeah, what do you want, Billodeaux? No retractions. No retractions ever.”

“This is not Joe Dean. I lifted his phone. I’m an informed source.” Nell lowered her voice into conspiracy mode. “The Sinners rookie kicker, Howard McCoy, is in a slump and hurting the team over breaking up with his girlfriend. She’s a grad student at LSU. Her name is Cassie Thomas. This is where you can find her in Baton Rouge.” She rattled off Cassie’s address and disconnected. “That should get her attention.”

“In a big way. Can’t wait to see the headline. How is this going to help exactly?”

“It will let her know how much he needs her in his life. Now, can you get us skybox tickets to the first game? We’ll make sure he knows Cassie is up there cheering for him.”

“Us—who is us? I’ll be down on the field. You will be in bed watching me play. Think of it this way, sugar. Only six more weeks to go. You’ve done a great job of carrying these babies. You don’t want to blow it now.”

“I want to go to the game. If Cassie gets to go, I do, too.”

“Tink, you know pregnancy makes you irrational.”

“I’m not irrational. I’m stir-crazy. I’ll go in a wheelchair. Nurse Wickersham can come along to watch me. I swear I’ll only sit there overflowing my seat like Jabba the Hut. Please, please, please.”

She stood up and all the bath foam dribbled off the crest of her belly. Joe helped her out of the tub and put his arms around her from behind or tried to. He had to admit, only to himself, she’d gotten so big he could hardly lace his fingers over her stomach anymore. Just below her navel that stuck out like an air tube on a beach ball, one of his babies kicked beneath his hands. He kissed his wife’s neck. “I’ll see what I can do, but only if your doctor allows it. Say, is Harry Connick, Jr.’s number still in my contacts?”

Nell checked. “Yes.”

“Good, after we get you dried off I’ll give him a ring and see if he can get Howdy’s mom a place in Musician’s Village down in the ninth ward. No matter what the boy says, he does not want to live with his mother.”

“Amen to that. Hand me my muumuu.”

“It’s not a muumuu. This is a plus-size piece of lingerie I bought for my sexy wife. Let me towel you dry. You know it’s been a long time for me, too, and I have more than another six weeks to hold out. Add more for your recovery time.” Joe took a heavy towel from the heated rack and began stroking it over her body. “That you are full of my babies is kind of a turn on.” He pressed his erection hard against the curve of her back as he reached around and wiped the bubbles from her belly, lifted each swollen breast and gently patted them with the soft terry, making sure no soap remained on the sensitive nipples by going round and round them.

“I can tell. I’d love to invite you in, but that’s a big no-no right now.”

“Not inside, can’t do that, no. Maybe this?”

He draped the towel over her shoulders in order to unzip his fly and probe between her legs from the back where her stomach would not get in the way. Warm and thick, he slid back and forth between her thighs. She grew wet and not from the bath. He moved his hands beneath her bulge and found her most sensitive spot. No stopping him or either of them now.

A single sharp wrap on the bathroom door made them freeze in position. A deep, authoritative female voice said, “Mrs. Billodeaux, you really need to get out of the tub now. I have a lovely cup of custard for your snack. Do you need help getting out?”

“No, Joe is helping me. I don’t want any custard.”

“She wants cream,” Joe answered. Nell snickered.

“Ice cream? We have several kinds.”

“No, just cream. I want to satisfy her cravings, Nurse. Say, do we have any rocky road?”

“I don’t think so, sir.”

“Great. Why don’t you go out and find us some because everything is under control in here, completely under control.

“Very well. I might be gone for half an hour.”

“Sounds about right. Better get going.”

Nurse Wickersham walked away and closed the front door to the condo quietly.

Nell tightened her thighs and moved her hips back into their former rhythm. Joe’s hands got busy again beneath her belly. Nell pressed her head under his chin and arched for him. “So you’re in control.”

“Sugar, I lied. This ain’t gonna take half an hour. And just think, we can get our strength back with a little rocky road.”

THIRTY-ONE

In her high-heeled white sandals, Cassie strode across the Louisiana State University campus. Never wear white after Labor Day—who cared anymore? The early September weather remained sweltering hot. She wore a pale gray pencil skirt with a significant slit up the back to free her long legs and topped it with a buttoned, short-sleeved white linen jacket over a silky, bright yellow chemise, more of her “impress Joe Dean” collection. She’d be paying the clothes off for the next two years and might as well enjoy them. While going into debt, she should have gotten a better bag to tote her laptop and papers than the old, battered one she’d used all through college.

Passing the student union, she unbuttoned the jacket. She’d taught her Psych 101 class and attended another she needed to graduate in December before noon. Her afternoon opened before her with no demands other than to work on her master’s thesis, the one she had second thoughts about now. Entitled
The Need to Know: The psychological necessity for adoptees to find their heritage,
she’d intensively interviewed fifty adults adopted as infants or very young children. Her findings urged more people to accept open adoptions and government and religious agencies to loosen the restrictions divulging parentage once the child reached twenty-one. Most of her subjects wanted to obtain this information if they had not already. Some gave up after meeting many roadblocks but remained unsatisfied, incomplete. A rare few stayed content, happy with the families who raised them, wanting nothing more.

Honestly, she thought she’d done right by pushing Howdy to discover his mother and father, not simply as names in a Bible but in person, flaws and all. She had no idea how great those flaws would be or the devastation that would cause to the world’s nicest guy. Doubting her ability to counsel anyone anymore, she would finish the degree she’d by started by emulating Nell and ended hoping to help troubled young women, only to discover she was still one of those girls herself. What a mess she’d made.

The aroma of pizza and expensive coffee tickled her nose as one of the lower union doors opened and closed revealing some of the selections available at the small restaurants and cafes inside the building. No money for five-dollar iced mochas or tempting pastas, she’d be better off financially making a sandwich back at the apartment. She kept on walking, considered cutting across the parade ground and taking a shortcut back to grad student housing, but the extreme heat of the day convinced her to stay on the sidewalk in the shade of the massive live oaks lining the way.

As she approached her place, she bundled her long hair with one hand and held it up off her neck to let the slight breeze dry the sweat trickling down her back. With the chemise clinging tightly to her breasts, she thought only of getting out of her stylish getup and into something cool and comfortable. A young man with a thoroughly professional looking camera stepped from beneath the staircase leading to her apartment, said, “All right!” and snapped her picture.

“What are you doing?” she challenged.

“You are Cassie Thomas, right?”

“Yes.”

“Jackpot!” he shouted and took off running in excellent athletic shoes.

She considered pursuit, but too hot and tired to care what student prank was afoot now, made her way up the stairs and into her unit where the air conditioner blasted out a significant amount of cold. She only hoped she wouldn’t find herself plastered all over FaceBook or some other media outlet with her head attached to a nude body. This close to finishing her Master’s Degree, she could not afford to lose her job.

Her roommate, Kim Wong, glanced from her computer as Cassie breezed through the living area on her way to the bedroom. Resembling a little China doll with her small stature, black bangs and short bob, Kim laid claim to being third generation American but still had the Asian work ethic driving her toward a medical degree.

“Hey, Cass, some guy, not that sweetie, Howdy, came looking for you. This jerk bangs on the door and takes my picture when I open up. Says ‘You Cassie Thomas?’ I say, ‘Do I look like a frickin’ Cassie Thomas?’ and slam the door in his face. Anyhow, someone is out to get you.”

“Yeah, and he did. Who knows what’s happening the way my life is going. Not that I don’t deserve everything that comes my way.”

“You lay more guilt on yourself than my Chinese grandmother could, and she’s really adept at it. You should call your honey and talk out your problems. I bet he still loves you.”

“When a man says you have destroyed him among other choice accusations, I doubt he ever wants to hear from you again.”

“Well, you’re the psychologist. The human mind is messier than a heart transplant. I’ll stick to healing the body. At least you know if a wound heals.”

“We have anything for lunch?”

“Half a cold pizza, some Ramen noodles, iced tea, beer, a couple of apples and a bag of salad past its expiration date. If you avoid the mushy stuff in the bottom of the sack, you can probably get your greens for the day. We do need groceries.”

“I’ll go on the weekend. It’s too damn hot to shop today. The eggs will boil in their shells. So, cold pizza and expired salad it is. Good enough to keep me going until Saturday.”

* * * *

If she’d stayed on campus and not ventured to the Winn-Dixie, Cassie might never have seen herself plastered on the front page of a tabloid at the grocery store as she waited to check out. She always chose a long line in order to get a free read of her guilty pleasure while waiting. But, there she was looking right at herself. The photographer hadn’t focused so much on her face as her breasts straining that chemise. He’d caught the curve of her arm holding up the mass of her hair like a model posing for a sensuous picture, but someone had Photoshopped her battered laptop case into oblivion. With her lips partly open from sucking in the hot air on her trek across campus and her startled blue eyes wide, she did look every bit like a woman the magazine could dub Howdy’s Hottie.

Howdy’s Hottie Causes Sinners
Slump

A reliable source told this reporter that ace kicker, Howard “Howdy” McCoy, has not been able to split the uprights since his breakup with LSU graduate student, Cassie Thomas. Last season, McCoy led the league with a ninety-seven percent success rate in kicking field goals and PAT’s. His golden toe lifted the Sinners into the playoffs but could not keep them there.

During the off-season, informants say McCoy fell hard for the voluptuous psychologist, a frequent visitor to quarterback Joe Dean Billodeaux’s ranch where she visits her son, Thomas, adopted by Joe and his wife, Nell. Presumably, the couple met there and only months later were spotted at the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas. Friends suspect an elopement gone awry. Bellagio maids who do not wish to be named confirm that Thomas abandoned McCoy in their luxury suite. The kicker secluded himself in the room and emerged only after being routed by his mother, well-known cabaret singer, Mariah Coy. He left behind a shambles of empty liquor bottles, pizza boxes, dirty dishes, and sheets.

The blunt-spoken Coy offered us this quote, “I wish the hell my boy would get over her or go after her because he is a damned mess right now. Howdy, if you read this, get up off your ass and take care of it.”

Returning to Louisiana, McCoy spent the summer volunteering at Camp Love Letter, Billodeaux’s retreat for seriously ill children and their families. Even this distraction failed to end his obsession over the fair Miss Thomas with whom he has had no contact since their parting. Since returning to the Sinners summer camp, Howdy has been unable to score, dare we say, because he cannot score with Cassie. His pre-season PATs stand at zero. Cassie Thomas, what must a guy do or not do to get your attention?

“Oh no, oh no, oh no,” she whispered. An inset picture of Howdy in his black and red uniform only made her heart squeeze harder. He smiled directly at her with that wonderful, loopy grin of his, certainly the most innocent Sinner that ever lived, and she’d ruined him. The article had the story completely wrong, naturally. She hadn’t left
him,
exactly the other way around. He’d made no attempt to get in touch with her, to apologize, but for what? Everything he said rang true, except for her being a whore of course, and she couldn’t disprove that. Lots of college girls slept around during their four years on campus, and he’d lumped her in with them. As for the cause of his slump, Mariah and his new found family shared the blame.

“Lady, move it,” a harried mother said as the toddler in her cart strained small hands toward a pack of gum in the impulse purchase racks.

The checker asked, “You gonna buy that?”

She shoved the tabloid onto the moving belt and unloaded her groceries after it. Once she returned to the apartment, she’d have to figure out a way to help Howdy without doing further damage. But how, but how?

Opportunity called before Cassie got the containers of yogurt and fresh bag of greens into the fridge. “I saw that tabloid story about you and Howdy,” Nell said. “Having been their target when Joe and I were seeing each other, I know how you must feel.”

“Awful. I don’t know what to do. It’s his family situation causing his problems, not me. He made it clear he never wanted to see me again. I stayed away from Lorena Ranch all summer because of that when I wanted to see Tommy so badly, wanted things to be the way they were before Vegas. I still don’t know who his father is.”