Summer Reads Box Set, Books 4-6 Page 8

  "I didn't steal them. They came on their own, and Madison went bankrupt."

  "Whose fault was that?"

  His gut tightened. "You know, I could drop you off on this street corner and have Monty all to myself this afternoon."

  Beverly shook her head. "No can do, Raymond. I told Monty you were giving me a ride, just in case you found a cliff to throw me over along the way."

  "What did he say?"

  "He said if we weren't both so stubborn and pigheaded, we'd probably make a good team."

  "Yeah, what does he know?" Raymond growled as he turned off the street and into the long driveway that led up to Monty's Bel Air home. "You and I could never work together again."

  "I agree with you."

  "You do?" He stopped the car behind a gold Mercedes. "That's a first."

  "But I think we could do other things really well together, if you didn't have such a youth complex. If you weren't looking to find young Raymond in young Elisabeth."

  His jaw dropped at her bluntness. "Jesus, Beverly, do you ever think before you open your mouth?"

  She shrugged. "It wastes too much time." She picked up her purse and opened the door. "Aren't you coming?" she asked when he made no move to get out.

  "In a minute."

  "Don't want to be seen with me? Afraid I'll ruin your playboy image?"

  "Beverly?"

  "What?"

  "Find another ride home."

  "Sure, why not. Maybe I can find a young, hard body, with a washboard stomach and bulging pecs. After all, if you can do it, why can't I?"

  He shook his head in bemusement, "I'd wish you good luck, but I don't think you're the one who will need it."

  "Raymond, as far as the account goes..." She paused, then grinned. "May the best woman win."

  Raymond couldn't stop the smile that spread across his face. She was a piece of work, but he was determined to win her—make that beat her.

  * * *

  Maggie listened to the phone ring, two, three, four times, then the machine picked up. Damn, they weren't there. Then she remembered Mary Bea's birthday party, Dylan's practice, Roxy's movie date. Lisa was no doubt busy chauffeuring them around town. Maggie felt another surge of guilt at leaving the kids alone with a woman they barely knew. Lisa hadn't been around kids in ages. She was probably ready to tear her hair out. Maggie smiled at that thought.

  As the tape beeped, she left her message. "Hi, it's Mom. I just wanted to see how you were doing. I hope you're not giving Lisa a hard time. Anyway, I'll call you later. I love you all. Bye."

  As she ended the call, she debated whether she shouldn't just go home. The traffic along Sycamore Boulevard whizzed by, and the cars were all nice—Lexuses, BMWs, even a Porsche. She looked at her serviceable mini-van and sighed. You could take the woman out of the suburb, but it was tough to take the suburb out of the woman.

  Checking the map on the seat beside her, she realized the spa was just a few blocks away. She might as well stop in. She pulled back into traffic.

  A few minutes later, she saw the sparkling white nude statues that Jeremy had described, and she knew she was in the right place. She turned into the driveway and pulled her car into a vacant spot in the lot. Once again the cars spoke of wealth, as did the elegant lines of the spa, which looked more like a stately mansion than a place to get sweaty and hit tennis balls.

  After fighting back another urge to flea, Maggie stepped out of the car and marched up to the front door. She still felt out of place, but she was determined not to show it. Meeting Serena Hollingsworth was worth a little discomfort. She needed answers, and there was only one woman who could provide them.

  The lobby of the spa was air-conditioned to a lovely state of cool. There were impressionistic paintings on the wall, glass tables and puffy white sofas resting on thick, luxurious white carpet. At one end of the room was a large half-moon reception desk.

  As Maggie approached the desk, a very muscular young man stood up. He was dressed in a short-sleeve white polo shirt and matching white pants. "May I help you?" he asked.

  Hans, as indicated by his nametag, glanced quickly down Maggie's body, obviously assessing her financial status as well as her physical attributes.

  "I--" Now that she was here, Maggie wasn't quite sure how to proceed.

  "Don't be shy," he said with a knowing smile. "We all have to start somewhere."

  "Excuse me?"

  "You've probably gotten busy with work and social events, let a few pounds slip on during the holidays, neglected your daily facial routine and morning jog, and now you're feeling like it's time to get rid of that old, dead skin and get ready for bikini season? Am I right?"

  "Exactly right," Maggie said, knowing full well she'd never put on a bikini in this lifetime.

  "I'm always right," he said with a proud smile. "We have several different plans, and I'm sure we can find one that will suit you."

  "Actually, I'm only in town for a few days. I'm not sure how long I'll be staying."

  "No problem. We have a one-day special that lets you try out all of our facilities. In fact, we'll assign you a personal trainer to take you through our weight room and assist you with the cardiorespiratory machines."

  "The what?"

  "Elliptical, Treadmill, etc.”

  "Oh, of course."

  "After your workout, you can take a sauna, Jacuzzi, swim in the pool, and end the day with a rubdown, massage, facial and manicure/pedicure session. In fact, I could probably get you into the salon if you'd also like a trim."

  Maggie patted down her hair self-consciously. "You think I need a trim?"

  "To go with the new you, absolutely."

  "The new me." She liked the sound of that. "You can really make me over in one day?"

  "We can get you off to a good start. I guarantee you'll feel like a new woman by the time you leave here today. In fact, you may not ever want to leave."

  Maggie considered his statement. She needed to look for Serena, and she was bound to find her somewhere in the spa, according to Jeremy. Why not treat herself at the same time? But it was a lot of money. How could she possibly spend so much on herself? She had three children growing out of their clothes and their shoes and their bikes. Still, it had been a long time since she'd spent anything on herself. And if it would make her feel like a new person, how could she say no? If it helped her retrieve her sanity, it would be money well spent.

  "All right," she said impulsively. "I'll do it. I don't have any exercise clothes, though, I was just coming to look."

  "We can fix you up with clothes."

  What the heck. She might as well go for it. After this weekend, she wouldn't spend anything on herself for the rest of the year.

  Hans motioned to another man who'd just come through the pair of double doors leading into the exercise area. "Rocco, I have a customer for you."

  Maggie swallowed hard as her gaze travelled up the long, stocky, powerful body of the man named Rocco. He was six foot five at least, built like a redwood tree, and rippling with muscles. Good Lord, Jeremy Hunt was right. L.A. was filled to the brim with beautiful people.

  "Name?" Rocco asked.

  She thought for a minute and decided to go with something new—to match the soon-to-be-new Maggie. "Crystal," she said. "My name is Crystal Scott."

  "How fast can you run, Crystal?"

  She could get through all twelve aisles at the supermarket in less than eight minutes. Seven if she skipped the cosmetics aisle, which she usually did. "Um, I'm not sure."

  "How far do you usually run?"

  She mentally estimated the distance between the couch and the refrigerator times fifty trips a day. "It depends."

  "On how much time you have?"

  Or how hungry, bored or depressed I am. "Exactly," she replied.

  He looked her up and down. "All right. I guess we'll have to find out what you can do." Rocco snapped his fingers, and a young woman who couldn't have weighed more than eighty pounds soaking wet sprin
ted out of the inner office. "Lara will show you where to change. I'll meet you in ten minutes." He turned to leave, then paused. "Make sure you fill out the section on health restrictions and sign the release form."

  "Release form?" she echoed faintly.

  "In case you pass out or have a heart attack or something, you won't hold us responsible."

  No, she wouldn't hold them responsible. They weren't crazy. She was.

  Rocco disappeared through the double doors, but before they closed, Maggie heard him call out to someone.

  "Serena, baby," he said. "Work it now. Work it hard."

  Serena. Maggie stretched her neck to catch a glimpse of Serena, but the doors slid shut, and she was left with Lara, Hans and a clipboard full of release forms. But Serena Hollingsworth was inside those double doors, and Maggie couldn't give up now. She was too close to finding out exactly what she needed to know.

  * * *

  "Nick. I don't want to know what you've done with the house. I don't want to see it." Lisa crossed her arms in front of her as Nick pulled the car away from the baseball diamond and headed toward the beach. They'd dropped off Mary Bea at her birthday party and Roxy at the movies, and for the next two hours they would be completely on their own. Lisa wanted to return to Maggie's house, but she knew that wasn't Nick's intent. She couldn't stand the thought of seeing their house again. In fact, she felt almost panicked at the thought. Why the hell hadn't Nick moved in all these years?

  "Did you see Dylan make that catch?" Nick asked as he maneuvered his way through the afternoon traffic. "The kid is incredibly athletic."

  "He does seem very good at baseball. Must be the Maddux in him. I don't remember Keith being a great athlete." Lisa paused. "I'm serious, Nick, I don't want to go to the house."

  "It's not the house. It's our house."

  "We're divorced. I signed the house over to you years ago."

  "Semantics."

  Lisa sighed. "Okay, bottom line—what's it going to take to get you to drive me back to Maggie's house?"

  "A miracle." He flashed her a cocky grin. "Think you're due?"

  "As a matter of fact, yes." Lisa sat stoically in her seat as the scenery grew more familiar. She remembered the Frosty Freeze where she and Nick had shared an ice cream. She remembered the library, the bookstore, the car wash, the deli, all the little stores and malls she'd frequented. She remembered the wide four-lane boulevards, the glorious palm trees, the blue-blue sky, the color of which Nick always said he saw in her eyes.

  She looked at each street sign, each storefront with a bittersweet sense of longing. These streets were not the streets of just her marriage, but of her childhood as well, her youth. She remembered going to the pizza parlor after the football game, eight people piled in a Volkswagen bug. She smiled at the memory, almost surprised that she still had good memories, after all the bad that had come later.

  Nick turned off the main boulevard and drove through a middle-class suburban area, where the houses were older, the lawns a bit faded, a neighborhood where children's bikes and skateboards were parked precariously on the sidewalks and lawns, where people still watered their grass on a Saturday afternoon and washed their cars with good old-fashioned elbow grease.

  Finally, Nick pulled into the driveway of a small frame house with a big front porch and a large oak tree that made the house seem smaller than Lisa remembered. Otherwise, it looked exactly the way she'd left it. The porch swing still hung from two rusty chains that creaked with the breeze. She couldn't count the times she'd sat in the swing, sometimes to escape the southern California heat, sometimes to listen to Nick play the guitar, sometimes to watch the birds build their nests in the sturdy branches of the trees.

  They had rented the house at first. When one of the elderly owners had died, the remaining spouse had offered it to them for a steal. They'd felt like the luckiest couple on the face of the earth. They were married. They had a home. They were expecting a baby. They thought their life together would be happily ever after.

  "What do you think?" Nick asked, as he shut off the engine. The tightness in his voice told her any answer would probably be the wrong answer. He was itching for a fight. She could see it in the tension of his shoulders, hear it in the coldness of his voice.

  She looked away from his penetrating eyes and focused on the house. "It could use a new coat of paint."

  "The salt from the ocean tears the paint right off. I put a new coat on a few years ago, but it didn't last."

  Great, they were talking about paint. They'd once made love in every room of the house, and now they were talking about chipped paint. She waited for him to say something more, but now that they had arrived, he seemed strangely reluctant to even get out of the car.

  "Why are you doing this, Nick?"

  For a moment she didn't think he would answer her, then his words came stiff and unyielding. "You never looked back, Lisa, not once. I watched you from the window. You just got in your car and left."

  "How would you know? You were drunk the day I left."

  "I was drunk, deliberately drunk, because the tequila was the only thing that took the edge off, that kept your knife from plunging all the way through to my heart." His voice faltered for a moment, then gained strength. "I'm not proud of the way I behaved, yelling at the doctors and at you. I just hurt so damn much. And you wouldn't talk to me. You wouldn't look at me."

  And she couldn't look at him now. She couldn't bear to see the pain in his eyes, the accusation.

  "You're doing it again." He pulled her chin around with his hand, his gaze revealing more anger than hurt. "Tuning me out. I hate when you do that. I remember that night, about a week after the funeral. You practically jumped out of your skin when I accidentally touched your breast, as if the feel of me was so repulsive you couldn't stand it."

  Lisa clapped her hands over her ears. "Stop it!"

  "Why? It's the truth. I came to you wanting, needing, and you walked away."

  Lisa heard the bitterness, the anguish, the accusation in his words, in his voice. She couldn't deny what he was saying, but whereas he had drunk to escape, she had closed off every emotion so she wouldn't feel anything. "I couldn't make love to you," she whispered. "I know you wanted a release from all the tension, but I couldn't give it to you."

  "A release?" he asked in amazement. "That's what you thought I wanted? My God, we'd just lost our daughter. You were so distant, so cold. I didn't want a release. I wanted you. I wanted to feel your heartbeat beneath mine. I wanted to be with you, so I wouldn't feel so damn alone."

  Lisa sucked in a breath of air, suddenly feeling as if she were suffocating. Nick had always been passionate and personal, unafraid to talk about the most intimate details of their life. At one time, she'd thought it good that he was so willing to tell her how he was feeling, but after—after it happened—she had hated his desire for conversation. She hadn't wanted to talk about any of it. She had felt like a failure, and talking about it only made her feel worse. Nick had kept pushing, and she'd kept withdrawing, until they were both angry. Finally, they'd given up.

  Nick threw open the door, letting a blast of fresh air into the car. "We're here. We might as well go in."

  "So you can prove to me—what?"

  "I don't know. I just think you should see the house."

  "When she—when it happened," Lisa amended, "everyone wanted me to forget, even you. My mother told me to think only of the good times and to go on with my life. She said I'd have other babies." Lisa's mouth trembled, and she fought back a wave of emotion. "She said someday I would understand why it had happened." She shook her head in bewilderment. "I've never understood."

  "You did forget."

  "No!" she yelled. "I didn't forget. How can you forget when a part of you dies?" She stared down at her hands, subconsciously twisting the engagement ring around her finger. "But I did move on, Nick. I wish you had done the same thing."

  "If you've truly put everything that happened in the past behind you,
why are you afraid to go into the house?"

  She couldn't answer his logic, so she gave up. "Fine. I'll go into the house. I'll look in every room. But I won't relive that night with you. I won't talk about what happened or why. Not now. Not ever."

  Lisa stepped out of the car just as a bird swooped across the yard and lit on one of the lower branches of the tree. Her heart stopped. The first robin of spring.

  "It's too early," Lisa whispered, turning to see the same stunned expression on Nick's face.

  He looked into her eyes. "They haven't been back since Robin died."

  "No."

  "Yes. That spring they built their nest, but something happened, and they never came back. Don't you remember?"

  She shook her head. "I don't remember."

  "You put them out of your mind like everything else, but I couldn't. It seemed so symbolic, that god damn empty nest. I used to sit out there in the late night and the early morning, staring at that nest, wondering why they were gone—wondering why Robin was gone."

  Lisa watched as the robin flew from branch to branch, as if it weren't quite sure where it wanted to be.

  "Are you trying to tell me that what happened had something to do with the birds abandoning their nest?"

  "Your mother thought it meant something."

  "Well, she would. If the robins left that spring, it's because they found a better place to go. It didn't have anything to do with what happened."

  "Then how come the robin has come back now—with you?" he challenged.

  "It's not with me." But was it? Lisa remembered the robin in L.A., the one she'd seen outside her office building. No, it couldn't be the same bird. Los Angeles was a hundred and fifty miles away. She strode briskly toward the house. "I thought you wanted me to see the place. I'm here, so let's go."

  "Fine." Nick followed her up the steps and unlocked the front door. He motioned her inside. "After you, milady."

  His voice faltered.

  "Oh, Nick." Her eyes filled with moisture as she remembered.

  "This is our palace, milady," Nick said with a grin as he carried her up the stairs, her wedding gown trailing over his arm and down to the floor of the porch. "I'm the king and you are my very beautiful queen." He lowered his head and kissed her warmly on the mouth.