Samantha Moon: First Eight Novels, Plus One Novella (48 page)

She had known that he was married. No doubt he had made me out to be a monster. No doubt he had painted a picture of an unfit mother. Unfit or not, she had chosen to cheat with a married man. My married man.

She set her phone aside, uncrossed her thin legs, and gave me a big smile. She was about to ask if she could help me, but then stopped short. Her mouth sort of hung open and her eyes narrowed. She was an ugly woman, I thought. I had no clue what Danny saw in her. Face too thin, skin too tan, boobs too fake. On second thought, I saw exactly what Danny saw in her. She was the opposite of me.

She jumped up and moved quickly around her desk, blocking my path. She crossed her arms under her fake breasts. Her nails were red and long. She looked like a whore.

“
What the fuck are you doing here?” she said.

I smiled and, without breaking stride, punched her straight in the face
.
She flew backward, bounced off the desk, spun around and landed on her face. On her nose, in fact. She moaned. I wasn’t at full strength and I certainly didn’t hit her as hard as I could, but she would remember me.

Danny appeared from his office door, open-mouthed. He looked at me and then at his secretary on the mohair rug. “Sam, what the fuck is going on?”

And as he stepped out of the office, I punched him hard in his stomach. He
oofed
nicely and doubled over. I grabbed him by the collar and threw him back into his office and shut the door behind me.

Chapter Fifty-six

I pushed him down into one of his leather client chairs and sat on the edge of his executive desk, which was big enough to land an F-17 on.

Danny still hadn’t gotten his breath back entirely. His face was purplish and contorted, and he was staring at me with frightened, angry eyes.

I kicked my legs pleasantly and whistled absently, waiting for his lungs to kick start again. Finally his short rasping breaths turned into longer rasping breaths. And when they did, words vomited from his mouth. “What the fuck are...who the hell do you...you have royally fucked yourself...how dare you attack....”

“Are you quite done, asshole?”

He sat up straighter, took in a long, agonized breath. “I demand to know what’s going on.”

“Well, since you asked so nicely.”

I grinned and continued swinging my legs. I shouldn’t have been enjoying this so much, but I was.

He looked at me with very confused, very dark eyes. Danny was not a big guy. Just a few inches shy of six foot, he was also too skinny for me, but I never told him that. I had always liked my men a little beefier, which is why Kingsley had been so damn intoxicating.

He said, “Do you have any idea the shit you just landed yourself in, Sam?”

“About as much shit as you landed in, dickhead.”

His eyes narrowed. “What the hell does that mean?”

There was a low moan from outside the closed door, followed by some sobbing. His secretary lying there on the carpet, crying, probably wasn’t good for business.

“
You’re the owner of The Kittycat,” I said. “Perhaps the world’s sleaziest strip club. In fact, you’re the sole owner of it.”

The color drained from his already pale face. He tried to sit up. I told him to stay where he was and he did so.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Sam.”

“
Of course you don’t. Deny everything, right? It’s the losers’ motto.”

“
Sam, you’re talking nonsense.”

“
Am I? All I have to do is make one call to any number of my friends in law enforcement, and they will come down hard on The Kittycat.”

“
Just wait a second, Sam. Whether or not I own the business is beside the point. It’s hardly a crime to run a strip club.”

I crossed my arms under my chest. My own natural bosom didn’t push up unnaturally through the top of my own blouse and I was proud of that.

“It’s a crime, Danny, when said business—in particular, a
strip club
—operates without a license.”

“
Shit.”

I grinned and sat back. I swung my legs some more. Seeing Danny squirm had just become my favorite new hobby.

“I’m in the process of getting a license—”

“
In the process of
and
having one
are two different things, Danny. And you know that. But you couldn’t wait, could you? You just had to open the doors to that shithole of sleaze.”

He said nothing. I could see his pressed shirt pulsating slightly over his hammering heart.
              His mind was spinning in ten different directions. But there was no getting out of this one. Not for him.

“
What the fuck happened to you, Danny?” I asked. “How does a respectable family man end up owning that dungeon of filth?”

“
I don’t have to answer you.”

“
Hey, I’m not the cops, Danny boy. There are no Miranda rights and I’m not wired. This is just between you and me.”

“
Well, you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. Now, can I check on Sugar?”

I laughed into my hand. “Sugar?”

“Not now, Sam—”

“
Her name is Sugar? Honest to God? Is she also one of your filthy strippers, Danny? Sucking up to the boss in more ways than one?”

“
Okay, you caught me. So sue me for looking outside of our shitty marriage for something more. So sue me for jumping on a chance to own something that’s going to make me a lot of money.”

“
You’re pathetic.”

“
And you’re a living nightmare. What the fuck do you want, Sam?”

I studied him long and hard. Sugar had quit sobbing from the other side of the door. Sugar wasn’t happy.

I said, “I want the house and I want the kids.”

He laughed. “No way. There is absolutely no fucking way I’m letting you around our kids unsupervised.”

“I don’t think you understand the quagmire of shit you find yourself in, Danny. If I say the word, the hammer comes down on your disgusting enterprise. You’re looking at an ungodly amount of fines, not to mention automatic disbarment. Oh, yeah, and the world will see you as the slimeball you’ve turned out to be. And I can’t wait to see what your mother thinks about all of this, too.” I paused, shaking my head. “No one stops to consider their mothers. It’s a pity.”

“
You forget, Sam. If you say anything, I will expose you for the monster you really are.”

I slipped off the desk and approached him slowly. I squatted down between his legs, resting my elbows on his knees. He was in a very, very vulnerable position.

“Expose me for what, Danny? Having a rare skin condition?”

“
I’ve got a vial of your blood, Sam. It’s in a safe deposit box. If anything happens to me, my attorney has been notified to have that blood immediately tested. Your secret will be out. You will be exposed to the light for the freak that you are.”

“
Perhaps you should have already tested the blood, Danny.”

“
What does that mean?”

I stood again and removed a folded piece of paper from my back pocket. Earlier, I had stopped at a Kinko’s and printed out Mel’s emailed test results.

“What’s this?”

“
My blood test results.”

“
What the fuck are you talking about?”

“
I had my blood tested, Danny. A variety of tests, too. The technician was asked to look for any irregularities. Look at the results yourself.”

He quickly read through the report. Attorneys, if anything, were great scanners.

“As you can see,” I said. “It says
no irregularities found
. My blood is normal, Danny.
Normal
. In every way. So have it tested. Do what you want with it. But I’m taking back my house, and I’m taking back my kids, and you damn well better believe that no sleazeball porn king who brings whores home to my kids will ever—
ever
—be welcomed into my house again. You have until eight p.m. tonight to move your ass out, and anything you leave behind will be trashed. Do you understand?”

He looked at the paper some more, then looked directly across at me, since I was once again squatting down at eye level. “So you won’t report me?” he said.

“You disgust me.”

And I leveled a punch directly into his groin. As he rolled out of the chair, gasping, I walked out of his office and didn’t even look down at his bleeding whore.

Chapter Fifty-seven

It was 8:30 p.m. and Danny had just left.

I gave him the extra thirty minutes out of the goodness of my cold heart, since, after all, he had been working so hard to get his shit moved out. The kids were off eating pizza with Mary Lou, my sister. They would come home to find their daddy gone. Traumatic for them, I know, but they would adjust. They had to adjust.

Before Danny drove off, with his Cadillac Escalade filled with all his crap, he informed me that he had talked Sugar out of pressing charges, mostly by offering her a massive raise. I reminded Danny that I wanted a massive raise, too, in the form of a butt-load of alimony and child support.

As he sat behind the wheel, looking utterly exhausted, he leveled a glare at me that was supposed to make me curl into the fetal position. I didn’t curl.

“This isn’t over, Sam.”

“
I certainly hope not,” I said. “I’m having too much fun.”

He shook his head and drove off. I watched him make a left turn and disappear out of sight, and I realized I didn’t even care where he ended up.

Smell you later, asshole.

I flipped the phone open and called my sister. “Bring them home,” I said.

*  *  *

We were all eating hot fudge sundaes that were oozing with whipped cream and chocolate syrup. And, yes, some of us were only
pretending
to eat. So far, my kids had not caught on that I could not eat like them. Mostly, they just saw mommy not eating at all, and when I did, the spitting-it-back-into-a-cup routine worked wonders.

Even with all the spitting, some of the ice cream and fudge made it down my esophagus, which caused some seriously uncomfortable cramps. After a few minutes of pretending to eat my ice cream, I finally ditched the bowl and emptied the cup-o’-spit down the garbage disposal. Mostly, no one noticed me, and I just sat there, glowing, watching my kids eat ice cream and laugh with their aunt...in the comfort of my own home with Danny not watching over me.

The kids had asked repeatedly where their dad was, and I told them that it was mommy’s turn to have the house, and that daddy was going to stay with a friend of his for a while, and that everything was going to be okay.

Tammy later came over and held my hand for nearly the entire night. She told me again and again how sorry she was for yelling at me on the phone. I told her again and again that it didn’t matter and that I loved her with all my heart.

When we were done with the ice cream, I grabbed a clean comforter from the hall closet and we all snuggled together on the living room couch and watched an illegal copy of
Toy Story 3
that Mary Lou had purchased at a liquor store. I told her I couldn’t condone such illicit behavior and vowed to purchase a real copy when the movie hit the DVD stands. Mary Joe stuck her tongue out at me.

About halfway through the movie, Anthony giggled. I knew that giggle.

“Oh, no you didn’t!” I cried out.

He laughed harder and lifted up the comforter. “Dutch oven!” he shouted and a wave of stink hit us.

We all piled out of the living room, laughing and tumbling over ourselves.

And later, after the room had cleared and after we had finished the movie, while Mary Lou was twisting Tammy’s long hair into a braid and while Anthony was showering, I found myself crying tears of joy.

Chapter Fifty-eight

It was the next night and I was getting ready for my big date. I didn’t often get nervous these days, but I was nervous as hell now. And while I got ready, my AOL account twirped. It was Fang.

See you in one hour, Moon Dance?

You bet
.

Are you nervous?
he asked.

More than you know.

Don’t worry. I don’t bite.

I would have laughed if my stomach wasn’t doing somersaults. I took a deep, shuddering breath. I really didn’t need such deep breaths, but they did help to calm me.