Looking for Laura, page 21
She used to like to display figurines. Figurines that had cost a hell of a lot more than books, as he recalled. She’d developed an obsession with Lladros, anemic porcelain renderings of happy peasants, milkmaids and rustics. Once, when he’d been whining about the Lladros to Paul over drinks after work, Paul had pointed out that things could have been worse; she could have been obsessed with those obnoxious little Hummel characters, chubby and maliciously gleeful in their pinafores and lederhosen.
In any case, he and Denise had been in total agreement over the disposition of the Lladro figurines during the divorce negotiations. She got them all, to his great relief, and he got miles of shelf space for his books and model cars.
“Don’t you use the town library?” Sally asked. “You should. You’re an editor. A man of letters.” A scornful laugh escaped her.
“I am a man of letters.”
“Then write an editorial about the library.”
“If I feel like it,” he grumbled. He didn’t let his mother dictate the contents of his editorials. He sure as hell wasn’t going to let Sally.
Inside the administration building—which, inexplicably, also smelled like damp socks—she located a campus phone and dialed a few digits. She listened for a minute, then hung up. “Tina isn’t answering. I’ll try her later.” She swept past him down the hall to the door, her sandals clicking quietly against the linoleum floor.
He paused to gauge his mood. He felt irritated, and this should have pleased him. Irritated was what he was used to feeling around Sally. Not intrigued. Not amused. Not enticed by the voluptuous waves of her hair, the voluptuous curves of her body.
He had always considered her a pain in the ass, and right now his butt was twinging. But the twinge had a definite sexual component to it, which only irritated him more.
She strode out of the building, letting the massive door swing shut behind her instead of holding it for him. He caught it in midswing and heaved it open again. She was already at the bottom of the steps by the time he was outside. He noted the way her skirt flowed around her hips and down her legs. Her thighs were inside that floral fabric. Sleek, strong thighs.
He sprinted down the steps, not bothering to wonder why he wanted to catch up to her. She continued to march at a brisk gait, but his legs were longer than hers and he easily closed the distance between them. “So, what are we going to do about this poet?” he asked, the torn flyer still clutched in his hand.
“I don’t know what you’re going to do about it.”
“What are you going to do about it?”
She shot him a quick, dubious look but didn’t break her stride. “I’m going to investigate.”
“Nancy Drew, huh.”
“No, not Nancy Drew. Nancy Drew wasn’t a cuckolded wife.”
“I don’t think wives can be cuckolded,” he remarked. “Only husbands. It’s a gender-specific word.” She might be an expert when it came to exemplar, but she was definitely on shaky ground with cuckold.
“Fine. Then what’s the wife equivalent?”
“I don’t know.”
“Oh. And here I thought you knew everything,” she said, her voice so drenched in sarcasm he was surprised she wasn’t leaving an oily trail of it behind her. “Anyway, how I investigate this is no concern of yours.”
“Of course it’s a concern of mine.”
“Because you’re a cuckolded friend?”
That didn’t sound right, either.
“Why don’t you keep working on the names on that computer disk?” she suggested. “I’ll deal with the poet.”
“Divide and conquer, huh.”
“Maximize our resources.”
“Cover more ground.”
“Avoid duplication.” She glanced up at him and he was delighted—and then dismayed—to see that she was grinning. Somehow, they’d wound up in agreement, in sync. That old, comfortable hostility was dissipating, leaving him on unfamiliar ground with Sally once more, a strange place where affection filled the air and thoughts about thighs filled his mind. Thoughts about bosoms. About auburn hair and strong fingers, and blue eyes flecked with silver.
“I like you better when I don’t like you,” he admitted, surprising himself with his candor.
Her smile widened. “Does it help if I assure you I don’t like you?”
He laughed. “It helps a lot.”
“Good.” She touched his arm again, her deceptively graceful fingers brushing against his wrist, and then turned and sauntered down the path to the gate. He remained where he was, watching her, trying to figure out why, if he didn’t like her, he liked smiling and laughing with her. And why, long after she’d walked through the gates and out of sight, he still felt the warmth of her fingertips against his wrist.
Rosie arrived at the New Day Café at eight-thirty, accompanied by Trevor. Their school was having teacher workshops all day, which meant all the classes were canceled. Rosie had slept over at Trevor’s house last night so Sally wouldn’t have to worry about having her at the café before dawn, when Greta was still baking, Sally was doing setups and the first of the early-shift cops started moseying in. But Trevor’s mother, Marcia, had appointments from nine through twelve, so Sally had offered to keep an eye on the kids until Marcia could pick them up again.
By nine-thirty, she was doubting the wisdom of this arrangement.
She’d given them wads of dough to play with. That had occupied them for a few minutes. Then she’d supplied them with crayons and paper. She’d kept them busy sweeping the kitchen, even though the floor was spotless, thanks to Greta’s compulsive Teutonic fastidiousness.
Sally had given them more dough, which they’d cheerfully rolled into pea-size balls and thrown at each other. She’d fed them a treat—croissants with melted chocolate drizzled over them. Then she’d scrubbed the chocolate from their fingers and faces and combed the flakes of croissant out of their hair. How crumbs had gotten into their hair she didn’t want to know.
The café was bustling. It always bustled. Her own fault, she supposed. If she hadn’t goosed Greta into jazzing up the joint years ago, if she hadn’t hung the curtains and the paintings and turned the place into a warm, welcoming bistro, it would still be the sleepy little coffee shop it had been when she’d first started working there, quiet and underperforming, barely profitable.
Instead, it was busy and noisy and earning tons of money. The scribe in black was at his usual table, sipping from a mug of French roast and writing feverishly in his notebook. The exercise ladies were unbuffing their buff bodies with blueberry tarts and jumbo mocha lattes. One of the salesclerks from the Batik Boutique up near the campus had just ordered six cappuccinos to go. Officer Bronowski would be showing up in about ten minutes.
Sally could have used Tina that morning. She could have used anyone. Regrettably, she had Rosie and Trevor, who were no use at all.
“Pretend these are bullets,” Rosie instructed Trevor as she rolled bits of dough into tiny pellets. She and Trevor occupied the floor in the doorway to the kitchen, at the far end of the counter. “If you get hit by one, you’re dead.”
“I don’t wanna be dead,” Trevor complained. He was a sweet, pale child, with wheat-colored hair, freckles and a wavering voice. One reason he and Rosie got along so well was that he usually deferred to her.
He wasn’t deferring today. Sally devoted a good chunk of her attention to their conversation, even as she counted out change for the clerk from the Batik Boutique. She silently rooted for Trevor. Turning dough into bullets seemed gory.
“Well, what do you want them to be?” Rosie challenged him. She sat cross-legged, the knees of her denim overalls nearly white from wear and her purple cloche perched on her head. “They could be ice. Like sleet. Then when they fall, they make the road all slippery and you could slip and crash and die.”
“I don’t wanna die,” Trevor insisted tremulously. “Can’t we make them snow? Then we can build a snowman out of them.”
“But if we made them ice, it could be like when my daddy died.”
“But it isn’t ice,” Trevor insisted. “It’s too warm, anyway. It’s spring. There’s no ice in the spring.”
“They’re magic pills,” Rosie decided, fluidly switching to a new scenario. “When you eat them, you can go anywhere you want. So I can see my daddy if I eat one.”
“Yuck!” Trevor giggled. “Are you going to eat one?”
“Sure. Are you?”
Sally pushed back the thoughts about Paul that Rosie’s make-believe had inspired and tried to remember what was in the dough: flour, water, salt, butter. No raw egg. If Rosie ate it, it wouldn’t taste good, but it wouldn’t make her sick, either.
Assured that Rosie couldn’t poison herself with the dough, Sally let the thoughts about Paul return—specifically, the understanding that Rosie wanted to see her daddy.
Sometimes she talked about Paul as if she expected him to walk through the front door at the end of the day and scoop her into his arms for a big hug. Sometimes she talked about him with anger—he was a poophead for driving his stupid car too fast, and she still remembered the time he wouldn’t take her to the circus in Springfield, and the time he yelled at her during her own birthday party, which really hadn’t been fair because it was her party and the birthday girl ought to get to do whatever she wanted, even if it was encouraging her guests to climb onto the garage roof and jump off.
Other times she didn’t mention him at all.
Lately, she’d been talking about Daddy’s Friend. All last night over dinner, she’d asked Sally about Daddy’s Friend as if she’d smelled him on Sally’s clothes or sensed him on Sally’s mind. Sally hadn’t mentioned that she’d run into him during her errand yesterday afternoon, but Rosie seemed to know. “I like Daddy’s Friend’s music,” she’d remarked. “I think we should get some Nirvana CDs. I like Nirvana. They scream a lot.”
Maybe Rosie needed a man in her life.
Fortunately, Sally didn’t need one in hers. Unless, of course, he joined her behind the counter and helped her fill the order of the construction worker who’d traipsed in, his hard hat shaping a bright yellow shell over his skull and his paunch swelling above an impressive tool belt.
Behind him stood Jonelle from the hair salon across the street. Behind her stood an elderly man with tufts of white hair sprouting above his ears and a galaxy of age spots decorating his bald scalp. The door opened with a tinkle of the bell, and the next person to join the line was Helen Sloane.
Sally acknowledged Todd’s mother with a smile and a wave. She was once again dressed like a real-estate broker, or maybe a high-school principal. Or an executive secretary. The woman exuded midlevel professionalism, in slate-gray trousers and a stylish pink sweater set that clashed with her hair. “The place sure is hopping today, isn’t it?” she commented to the white-haired gentleman.
“Eh?” he bellowed.
Helen smiled at him, then edged past him and approached the counter. “Do you need help?” she asked Sally.
Sally recalled joking with her yesterday about her taking a job at the New Day. They had been joking, Sally was sure. A brief fantasy for a woman unappreciated by her son at her office, and an equally brief fantasy for an overworked coffee shop manager.
“It’s not snow!” Rosie erupted from the far end of the counter. “It’s ice!”
“No, it’s not!” Trevor shouted back in a wobbly voice.
“What’s with them?” Helen asked, rising on tiptoe to peer over the counter at the squabbling children. “You’re baby-sitting?”
“I’m afraid so.” Sally snapped a lid onto the cup she’d just poured and wedged it into a cardboard tray. “School’s closed today.”
“Let me lend you a hand. I’m not useless. I could pour coffee.”
“Helen, I don’t know—”
“Or I could watch those two. What are they throwing at each other?”
“Dough.”
“Oh, for God’s sake.” Without waiting for permission, she hurried around the end of the counter, strode past Sally and planted herself in front of Rosie and Trevor, legs spread and arms akimbo. “Do not throw dough,” she said, enunciating each word so precisely they stopped to gape at her.
“Who are you?” Rosie asked.
“I’m Helen Sloane. Do not throw dough.”
“I didn’t wanna throw it,” Trevor defended himself. “She made me.”
“Did not!”
“Did too! You said it had to be ice.”
“I said it could be bullets.”
“Don’t throw it,” Helen warned.
It occurred to Sally that Helen had matters under control at her end of the counter. She turned back to the construction worker and, with an apologetic smile, said, “Can I get you anything else?”
By the time the bell above the door had stopped tinkling and the traffic had dwindled, Helen and the children were seated under the center table in the kitchen, creating a village out of paper cups, paper plates and empty boxes from the plastic cutlery. No strains of bickering emerged from the room, no whimpering, no whining.
Half the tables in the dining area were occupied: the black-clad artiste scribbling, a pair of middle-aged women chattering over bran-apple muffins and herbal tea, a professional munching on a bagel while reviewing documents from a leather portfolio, and Officer Bronowski, who’d showed up an hour later than usual because he’d had to fill in for the DARE officer at the middle school. He was stoically nibbling on a sticky bun. In three minutes he’d be ready for his refill of coffee.
Aware of those three minutes ticking down, Sally spied on Helen and the children from the kitchen doorway. “You’re a miracle worker,” she praised Helen. “How did you get them to calm down?”
Helen gave them each a few plastic stirrers, then straightened up and dusted her hands. “I’m bigger than them. They had to listen to me.”
“Mommy, guess what?” Rosie sent her a dimpled grin. “Helen is Daddy’s Friend’s mommy!”
“Yes, I know.”
“I told her about the necklace Daddy’s Friend brought me.”
Bought you, Sally almost corrected, but she kept her mouth shut. She wondered whether Todd had told his mother about their outing to Boston, whether that was why she’d taken such an interest in the New Day Café. Maybe she’d wanted to eyeball the woman with whom her son had journeyed to the city, for whose daughter he’d invested in jewelry. Maybe Todd had implied things about their relationship….
A patently laughable idea. First of all, there was nothing to imply, and second of all, there was no relationship.
She measured Helen’s expression, searching the woman’s dark eyes and the creases weighing down the corners of her mouth for a sign of whether she knew or cared about her son’s weekend activities. “A rice necklace,” Helen said.
“That’s right.”
“It sounds ridiculous.”
“It is.”
“It’s beautiful,” Rosie insisted.
“How are things out there?” Helen gestured behind Sally. “Is there a line of customers?”
“Not at the moment.” She checked her watch. “In ninety seconds Officer Bronowski will be wanting a coffee refill.”
“Arthur Bronowski is a man of habit.” Helen glanced at the children, satisfied herself that they were peacefully engaged, and joined Sally at the door. “I know all the cops on the force. You’ve got to when you’re running a newspaper. They’re sources, every single one.”
“Really?” Sally couldn’t imagine Officer Bronowski revealing anything worth printing in the Valley News.
“Not only are they sources, but they won’t ticket your car if you’re parked illegally while pursuing a story. Ask Todd. If he got a ticket for every time he parked illegally in pursuit of a story, he’d have to take a second mortgage.”
“He doesn’t write stories, does he?”
“Rarely now. But he used to. Believe it or not, I used to—before they put me on the shelf.” She gazed out at the dining room. “So, you don’t need me to pour coffee?”
“Do you really want to pour coffee? A woman who used to write stories for the Valley News?”
“I need to do something.” She sighed and patted her hair, as if she thought a strand might have broken free of its lacquer. “My husband has this ridiculous idea of taking me to Hilton Head Island for a month. Golfing. Can you imagine anything more boring? For a whole month.”
“Some people enjoy golfing,” Sally argued.
“The ball is too small. Why can’t they use a bigger ball? And a nice paddle instead of those silly golf clubs. Whoever invented golf just wasn’t using his head.” She glanced over her shoulder at the children, hard at work under the broad aluminum table. “That Rosie of yours is something. I can see why Paul always said she was the light of his life. She’s a charmer. She reminds me of me.”
Sally refrained from grinning. “She isn’t always charming,” she said modestly, even though as far as she was concerned Rosie was close to perfect. “You really worked wonders with them, though. I didn’t know you were so good with children.”
“I’m not so good with them. I just don’t put up with crap from anyone smaller than me—which isn’t too many people, but such is life when you’re short. Anyway, I’ve had experience with my grandchildren.”
“Grandchildren?” Did Todd have children? Paul had never mentioned any. Todd himself had never mentioned any. Did his ex-wife have custody of them? Did he ignore them, spending his weekends searching for a mysterious Laura in Boston instead of taking his kids to the roller rink and McDonald’s?
“My daughter’s children. Aged seven and four. Cassandra and Henry. I keep them in line.”
So Todd had a niece and nephew. So he had a sister. The influx of information stunned Sally, even though there was nothing particularly astonishing about any of it. “Do they live around here?”
