Once Upon a Project (40 page)

Chapter 1

Suzanne's eyes narrowed when her hostess spoke French to her husband. She only knew one French phrase, that
Voulez-vous
line from a lyric to an old Labelle song. That translated to the rather tacky proposition, “Will you go to bed with me?” Micheline Trent hadn't said
that
to Brad, but judging from that broad smile on her face and the soulful look in her eyes, she might as well have. Suzanne had been in the Trent home for less than an hour, but she was ready to shove Micheline's face into the cheese dip that sat in a bowl on the table.

When Micheline disappeared, returning moments later with a can of Miller Genuine Draft, Suzanne figured out what she'd said to Brad. Nothing wrong with offering to refill a guest's pilsner, but her eyes narrowed when Micheline leaned over to pour the beer, the right side of her tailored white blouse falling away from her chest enough to reveal a glimpse of unspectacular cleavage in a scalloped white bra that nonetheless seemed to capture Brad's attention.

Micheline's demonstration lasted just a few seconds, but every muscle in Suzanne's body went on alert. To think she'd actually been happy about coming here to watch the Super Bowl. When Brad told her they'd been invited to watch the game at the home of one of the guys from the golf club, she'd been thrilled not to have to spend the evening with their neighbors, Lisa and Darrell Canfield. Suzanne had tried to put a good face on it to appease Brad, but the Canfields ranked among her least favorite people, and she figured anyone's company would be better than theirs. It looked like she'd been wrong.

Suzanne watched as Micheline returned to sit next to her husband, Errol, cozying up to him in an oversized chair that was more like a small loveseat; two people could fit on it provided they didn't carry too many pounds between them. Without even realizing it, Suzanne moved her hand to rest on Brad's thigh, as if staking out her territory . . . or perhaps to try to make up after the words they'd had on the short drive over here.

Her gaze shifted from the uninteresting action playing out on the screen of the large plasma television to her hosts. Micheline's head rested on Errol's shoulder, and his arm was draped around her. The affection between them seemed genuine enough. Could she have just imagined Micheline's come-on to Brad? After all, Errol sat right there in the same room, along with five other guests. A person would have to be some kind of idiot to even try to carry on a flirtation with so many witnesses.

Or crafty as hell.

One of the players was running with the football, and everyone in the room either cheered or jeered. Suzanne, who knew nothing about football, took her cue from Brad, who cheered. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Micheline throw her arms around Errol and embrace him. Errol shifted to face her, his hand roaming dangerously high over her thigh, to where the hem of her short denim skirt met her skin. A laughing Micheline playfully smacked it away, with a Hiss of, “Later!”

Suzanne began to feel better. Micheline already had a husband who was good-looking, sexy, and successful. She'd probably just wanted to test her French on someone who understood a little of the language. This was Jacksonville, not New York or New Orleans. How many people here spoke French? Even Brad's knowledge of it was limited to a few basic phrases he'd learned for a trip to Paris they took a few years back. And as far as the opportunity Brad had to look down Micheline's blouse, she probably just didn't realize it had fallen away from her chest when she bent over. So what if Brad got to peek into her cleavage. It was a natural action. Wouldn't her eyes have lingered if she saw an attractive man pulling off his shirt?

Suzanne chided herself for being so paranoid. The last thing she wanted to become was one of those women who felt that every other member of the species was after her man. It probably had to do with the feeling she'd had lately that she couldn't shake—the fear that something wasn't quite right in her marriage. The conversation she and Brad had on the way over here didn't help any.

Once again she glanced at the Trents, sitting so companionably in the oversized chair. What an attractive couple they made. Suzanne had been surprised to see how young they were. Memberships at the golf club didn't come cheap, and most of the members were in their forties, fifties, and sixties. But of course, Errol Trent was some kind of a dentist—an oral surgeon, Brad had said—and could probably afford it. She put his age in the mid- to upper thirties, while Micheline appeared to be about thirty.

Thirty.
Suzanne swallowed past a lump in her throat. How nice it would be if she could be that age again. She'd be forty-two this year and was acutely aware of getting older. Her son Bradley was fifteen and way taller than she was. Being around younger women like Micheline gave Suzanne the unwelcome feeling of being past her prime.

 

 

Right after the first quarter, Micheline announced she was bringing out the refreshments. Suzanne quickly offered to help, not so much to be of assistance than to maybe get a chance to chat privately with her hostess, get a better feel for her personality. She seemed like a fun type. Maybe they could even get to be friends. Suzanne didn't play golf, but she'd go down to the club and wait for Brad to come off the links if she had a friend there she could have dinner with.

“Everything's so lovely, Micheline. Did you do this all yourself?” she asked as she admired a tray of honey-dipped chicken drummettes Suzanne removed from the oven, where they'd been keeping warm.

“Sure. It was easy.”

“I guess it helps that the Super Bowl is on a Sunday, huh? It gives you the whole weekend to prepare.” Suzanne watched as Micheline removed a raw vegetable tray from the refrigerator, taking it from her so she could retrieve other foods. “I always liked the idea of having the big game on a Friday night, but I guess that would make preparation difficult for women who aren't stay-at-home moms like me.” Suzanne did enjoy informing people that she was a homemaker and had been for years. Many of the wives of Brad's colleagues had high-powered careers, but her status as housewife and stay-at-home mother had excused her from having to discuss a professional life.

“Well, I might not be a mom, but I don't work.”

Suzanne nearly dropped the tray. A few cherry tomatoes did fall off before she placed it down on the countertop. She swiftly replaced them. “Oh. You don't?” She didn't understand. The Trents had no children. What was Micheline doing staying at home?

Of course. Like herself, Micheline had simply opted to stop working because she didn't have to. It was one thing to practice medicine or law, teach school or even run your husband's office. But if you had no training to do anything of substance, why go out and punch a clock every day for ten dollars an hour when your husband brought in big bucks?

Suzanne listened intently as Micheline explained she had been ill at the time of her marriage to Errol and that he insisted she stay home and recuperate. Micheline concluded her explanation with a shrug. “One thing just led to another. It's been almost three years, but Errol has never pushed me to go back to work. I think he enjoys having dinner ready when he gets home, or being able to invite guests over for dinner on a weeknight. I won't say I haven't enjoyed taking a break from working, but after all this time I'm starting to get a little restless. I'll probably start job hunting soon.”

“I hope you won't have too hard a time. It's a tough job market out there.” Suzanne forced herself to sound sympathetic, but she couldn't understand why Micheline would want to shelve books at the library or deal with irate callers on a customer service line somewhere when she could stay at home.

Micheline removed a large glass bowl containing tossed salad from the extra wide refrigerator. “I don't expect to have that difficult a time. There's a lot of law firms in town.”

“Law firms?” Suzanne repeated uncertainly.

“Yes. I'm a trilingual paralegal, English, Spanish, and French.” Then Micheline asked, “What did
you
do before you had your kids, Suzanne?”

“Trilingual, huh? How interesting.” So Micheline
wasn't
like her, a high school graduate with no professional work experience. Now that the ball was in Suzanne's court, she scrambled to come up with an answer that wouldn't make her sound insignificant. “Before my son was born I . . . uh, worked with patients at a diagnostic center.”

“Oh. X-ray technician?”

Suzanne wanted to say yes, but she couldn't take the chance of exposure if Micheline asked for details of her work that she couldn't supply, or worse, mentioned something about her former “career” to Brad. “Actually, I ran the office.” That wasn't true, either, but she couldn't say that she'd merely greeted patients and set up appointments for ra-diologic screenings and follow-ups, not after Micheline said she was a paralegal. Suzanne wasn't even sure what that was, but it sounded important. Micheline must really know French inside and out if she spoke it on the job. And she knew Spanish, too? Suzanne didn't think she'd ever met anyone who spoke three languages, not even among those in Brad's circle.

“Did you work at Brad's diagnostic center?” Micheline guessed.

“As a matter of fact, yes. That's where we met. He and his first wife were divorcing at the time.” That wasn't exactly the truth, either. Brad was very much married when Suzanne was hired for the reception desk.

Suzanne still remembered the jealousy she'd felt toward Lisa Betancourt from the moment she saw her framed photograph on Brad's desk. Lisa was pretty, still had a trim figure after having had a child, and she worked as a pharmacist. Suzanne always had the same thought whenever Lisa stopped by the office to see Brad:
Who is this woman to have so much, while I have next to nothing?
Lisa would flounce in and ask for Brad in a pleasant but impersonal manner that nonetheless made Suzanne feel like, well, the help. Never mind if she
was
an employee. Lisa had a way about her that made Suzanne feel about three feet tall.

Sometimes Lisa would bring their cute toddler daughter, Paige, with her on visits to Brad at the office. Suzanne hated them both. Not only did Lisa have poise and intelligence, but she had style as well. She knew how to pair a tailored blouse and expensive-looking leather flats with jeans in a way that looked downright elegant, and how to add little accessory touches like tying a silk scarf around the strap of her shoulder bag. As for little Paige, she was just too adorable, even then with a strong resemblance to her mother. Suzanne learned from staff gossip that Lisa came from a family in Georgia who had been major players in the civil rights movement of the sixties. Important people had come to their home.

Suzanne, on the other hand, had grown up in Palatka, Florida, the eldest child of teenage parents who married four months before her birth. The marriage almost immediately went on the rocks, but a reconciliation years later resulted in two sons and a brief period of nuclear family life before the marriage busted up for good. Suzanne had only seen her father, Derrick Hall, Sr., a few times since. Suzanne's mother, Arlene, later had an affair with a younger man that resulted in an unplanned pregnancy. Arlene's lover was long gone by the time she gave birth, and she gave her new baby daughter the same last name as her other children, Hall.

Theirs had been a hardscrabble childhood, with telephone and electricity often being turned off. They never really went hungry, but they often ate unorthodox meals, like melted cheese sandwiches for breakfast or pancakes for dinner. Their house—not much more than a shack, actually—which Arlene took over after her parents passed away, was always in need of repairs. The roof leaked, the faucets had to be turned gingerly or else they would fall off, and the hot water heater worked intermittently.

While Lisa had gone to college and then pharmacy school, Suzanne had gotten a job after high school to help her mother pay the bills. It didn't seem like a big deal. Suzanne's intelligence wasn't geared toward books and learning. She was more savvy than smart.

So there she was, looking on enviously as little Paige ran to her father's arms, as Brad laughingly scooped her up and draped an arm around Lisa. Then the attractive family would stroll back into his office, like they didn't have a care in the world.

Even Brad himself had little to say to her back in those early days. Suzanne doubted he even knew her name. But then something happened. Lisa's visits became less frequent and then stopped altogether, and the office scuttlebutt was that the Betancourt marriage had crumbled.

Suzanne engaged in watchful waiting, and the moment Brad removed Lisa's photograph from his desk she tentatively knocked on his office door and asked if he could answer a few questions about medicine for a school paper—fabricated, of course—her little sister was doing. He did, which led to him asking about her family, which led to him asking about
her
.... Suzanne did her best to be sparkling and enchanting. She recognized that Brad was lonely and uncertain from the breakup of his marriage, and she wanted to be the one who brought laughs and fun back into his life. It seemed only natural for Brad to ask her to join him for dinner, and from that point on neither of them ever looked back.

The only sticky point in their marriage was when, shortly before they moved into their dream house in Jacksonville, they learned that the house under construction next door was being built by none other than Lisa and her second husband, Darrell Canfield. Sometimes Suzanne still couldn't believe that such a crazy thing had happened. Brad decided he wanted to live closer to Jacksonville rather than the remote area they resided in on the outskirts of St. Augustine, well south of the city. He purchased a newly constructed home on a riverfront cul-de-sac from a colleague whose marriage had broken up. He and Suzanne didn't learn that the house under construction next door belonged to Lisa and Darrell until right after they closed, when the Canfield family pulled up to inspect the progress of the construction. That represented the beginning of years of tension between Suzanne and Lisa. In the five years since, they'd managed to make the best of it. Suzanne treated Lisa politely to make Brad happy, and she suspected that Lisa tolerated her at Darrell's insistence.