Absolutely, Positively (13 page)

“It’s okay,” Em said. “I think the more I talk about the breakup the better I’ll be. I mean, thanks to Oscar, I know Joseph and I weren’t meant to last—”

My stomach free-fell.

Marisol started coughing, hacking really.

Dovie rushed over, started slapping Marisol on the back, and shoved a piece of bacon in Em’s mouth. “Tasty, isn’t it? Now, Marisol, what were you saying about Rufus?”

At his name, Rufus barked and brought his chicken over and set it in Preston’s lap. She threw it down the hall. “Wait. Back up. How would Oscar know—”

“Rufus could really be sick,” Marisol said loudly. “We should get him checked out immediately.” She jumped up. “The sooner, the better.”

Em mouthed,
Sorry,
to me. She’d forgotten Preston didn’t know about the auras. Easy enough to do—Preston was around a lot these days, so much so that it was hard to remember she wasn’t another branch of our dysfunctional, piecemeal family tree, but a reporter who’d love nothing better than a big scoop.

“Right now?” Dovie asked.

“Right now. You can pick him up this afternoon.”

“I can get him on my way home from work,” I volunteered.

“No!” Marisol shouted.

We all stared at her.

“I mean, there will be paperwork. It has to be Dovie.”

“I’ll get his leash,” Dovie said.

Marisol grabbed my arm. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”

As she pulled me into the front hall, I heard Preston say to Em, “How much do you know about Cutter?”

I should have stayed in bed.

Marisol’s shoes tapped along the slate floor in the entranceway. A wide stairway split the large front hall, and I leaned against the oak newel post. “What’s going on, Marisol?”

“Shh, shh. Okay, so you know how you’re looking for a boyfriend for Dovie?” Marisol’s dark eyes gleamed. “I was thinking she’d be a great match with Dr. Kearney.” She took her quilted coat from the rack near the door and did a fancy looping thing with her scarf.

“Your boss, Dr. Kearney?”

Indirect sunlight was starting to spill through the transom window and sidelights, illuminating just how cozy Dovie had made her home over the years. The warm woods, the natural elements like the stone floor, and the rich colors all worked so well together. Throw in the little bits of glitz and glam, like the tiny crystals on the curtains, and the place fairly radiated Dovie’s personality—the interesting mix between an elegant woman and the showgirl she used to be. “Didn’t you sleep with him?”

“No, he’s twenty years older than me!” Her tone tried for offended but couldn’t quite pull it off.

I tapped my chin. “Didn’t you
want
to sleep with him?”

Sheepishly she tucked her hands in her coat pockets and rocked on her heels. “Briefly, during my Professor Higgins phase.”

Marisol had gone through many phases. “But didn’t you two date?”

“We had coffee. Once. Lucy!” She clapped her hands. “You’re getting sidetracked.”

“But he’s twenty years younger than Dovie.”

Marisol grinned. “I know. Isn’t it great? Dovie as a cougar?”

“What cougar?” Dovie asked, coming down the hall with Rufus, his toenails clacking on the stone. “Don’t tell me you have one at the clinic.”

Marisol’s dark eyes sparkled. “I will this afternoon.”

Dovie glanced my way with an I-didn’t-serve-mimosas-this-morning-I-swear kind of look, but before she could say anything, Marisol grabbed the leash, the rubber chicken, and kissed my cheek, then Dovie’s. “Thanks for breakfast. Bye!” she yelled down the hall, and slipped out the front door, Rufus leading the way down the curving walkway.

Dovie stared after them with a long-lost look in her eye.

I sidled up, slid my arm around her shoulders. “You’re going to miss him, aren’t you?”

“Ha! He’s such a nuisance. Always begging me to throw that damn rubber chicken.” She craned her neck to watch as Marisol opened the back door of her SUV and urged Rufus inside. Dovie might not have realized it, but her hands were shooing him into the car from afar. “I’m going to get carpal tunnel from that mutt.”

“Uh-huh,” I said. I closed the door and Dovie moved to peek through the sidelight as Marisol drove down the lane, disappeared down the slope leading to the street.

“Well, back to the real world. I need to get ready for Zumba, and stop at the bakery, and my nails are in desperate need of a manicure. Oh, and a massage would be heavenly.” She stopped, grabbed my arm. “He’ll be okay, right?”

I smiled. “He’s in the best of hands.”

She nodded, but I knew she wouldn’t be convinced until Rufus was home.

In the kitchen, Em was alone at the breakfast table. “Where’s Preston?” I asked.

“Powder room. What do you think? Kauai or Maui?” She held two brochures, one in each hand, as if weighing them.

“Can’t go wrong with either.” Dovie patted Em’s head as she walked by.

I noticed the newspaper on the counter. I skimmed the article. “Preston wrote a story about Rufus getting a new home?”

Dovie rinsed a mug, set it in the dishwasher. “I may have mentioned it would be a good way to keep Mac’s name in the news. Someone has to know something. People just don’t disappear without a trace.”

I worried my lip. I didn’t want to burst Dovie’s bubble, but many people often disappeared just that way. Poof, gone, as Preston would say.

“I’m going to go back to Mac’s house today. Mac’s granddaughter, Christa, mentioned something about Rufus’s food. I wonder if he eats a special blend. That might explain why he’s not eating now. While I’m there I can press Jemima Hayes for more information. Have you met her husband?”

“Rick? No.”

“Rick Hayes?” Em said, dropping her brochures. “My God,” Em sputtered. “I had a poster of him on my wall as a teenager.”

“Who?” Preston said, coming into the room.

“Rick Hayes,” I said.

“Jemima’s husband? Why?”

“He was hot,” Em said.

“He’s
old,
” Preston said, wrinkling her nose.

Dovie shot her a look. Rick had to be at least twenty-five years younger than my grandmother. And if there was one thing Dovie didn’t like being labeled, it was old.

Em explained how Rick had been a contemporary of Bryan Adams and George Michael (a name Preston actually recognized but for all the wrong reasons), but he had never really had a hit until the late nineties, when one of his songs was chosen as the theme for a popular sitcom. It stayed at the top of the charts for months and even won a Grammy. Rick toured for a while, the arenas getting smaller and smaller. Now he took jobs wherever he could.

“I saw him sing at the Marshfield Fair last year,” Em said, heading for the coffeepot. “He wasn’t very good, but he still has a certain appeal.”

“He’s broke,” Dovie said, “and trying to sell a reality show based on him making a comeback.”

Shaking her head, Em said, “That’s just sad.”

There was nothing worse than a fallen idol.

I glanced at the plate of waffles, but sadly I had no appetite. I poured a cup of juice.

Preston said, “I have to go— Algebra calls. Have you talked to Meaghan Archibald yet, Lucy?”

I’d called Preston right after I hung up with Aiden last night. “Not yet. I’ll call you as soon as I do.”

As Dovie walked Preston to the front door, Em looked at me. “Am I crazy?”

I smiled. “Why do you ask?”

“For this?” She held up the brochures. “For wanting sunshine, warm sand, and lots of fruity drinks with umbrellas? I wouldn’t be opposed to a muscled, gorgeous cabana boy, either, but I don’t want to be greedy.”

“Crazy like a fox! It’s a great idea, and with spring break it’s the perfect time to go. I just hate seeing you go alone.”

She lifted her shoulder in a shrug. “It won’t be so bad. It’ll give me some time to sort through my life.” Jumping up, she launched into a hula dance. “Just think, this time tomorrow I’ll be on a beach in Kauai.”

She hulaed around the breakfast table. “Did you know I wanted to go to Kauai in the first place for the honeymoon, but no. Kauai wasn’t good enough for Joseph. You know what?” she asked, swaying her arms. “I gave in a lot with him. Now I don’t have to. It’s freeing. I’m free. To do what I want. See who I want.”

I hulaed with her and said softly, “Like Aiden?”

A smile spread across her face. “Maybe.”

They’d been tiptoeing around each other, fighting their feelings for months. But now … Now Em was free.

I swayed my hips. “How long will you be gone? A week?”

I couldn’t help a tiny stab of envy. A vacation sounded wonderful. An escape from life. Just for a little while. I could easily see Sean and me taking a long walk on a beach, watching the sun set in the Pacific. No missing persons, no one wanted by the FBI. Heaven.

Except … that vision.

I winced as pain shot through my stomach. I had to stop thinking about it.

Em’s arms jerked up and down. She really needed hula lessons. “I’m going to skip classes tomorrow and Friday. That gives me ten days.”

“I’m jealous.”

“It is a bit decadent, isn’t it?” She stopped dancing. “There’s a flight at two. I’ll take a train into town.”

When Em set her mind to something there was no stopping her. “Take my car. You can leave it with Raphael and take the water taxi to Logan. You don’t want to lug your suitcases on the train.”

She threw her arms around me. “What would I do without you?”

I hummed a Hawaiian song that came out sounding more like a Swiss yodel. We danced side by side, giggling like we were five years old again and making up dances in my mother’s music room.

The back door opened and Thoreau bounded in, barking and shaking snow from his fur. Sean stood in the doorway with a dazzling smile, taking in the scene. Em and I kept on hulaing.

“Em’s going to Hawaii,” I said.

“I’m jealous,” he said. He looked handsomely rumpled with his bed head. He must have seen the note I left and come straight up to the house.

“You two should go,” Em said. “You know, when this case is over. You two deserve a vacation. Sun, sand, romance,” she added, batting her eyelashes.

Oooh, oooh, and oooh la la.

“What? Who’s going where?” Dovie asked, joining in the hula. Her moves put Em’s and mine to shame.

“Lucy and Sean. To Hawaii,” Em said.

“No, no. Just dreaming,” I said.

Dovie jabbed my rib cage playfully and winked. “Sometimes, LucyD, dreams really come true.”

I glanced at Sean.

I love you, Lucy Valentine.

“I know,” I said to Dovie. “I know.”

15

Sean had stolen Dovie’s newspaper and had it spread out on my couch. He leaned back, stretched his arms over his head. His gray eyes looked nearly opaque in the morning light. Stubble covered his superhero jaw, and the slightest hint of darkness caressed the skin under his eyes. He hadn’t slept well, and it showed.

I’d taken a quick shower and was letting my hair air-dry today, using extra antifrizz cream to control the waviness. Sean had already put away the dishes in the dishwasher and cleaned the coffeepot.

“Do you feel okay?” he asked.

I didn’t want to lie. “So-so.”

He came into the kitchen. “You haven’t been sleeping well.”

“Neither have you.”

“This isn’t about me.” With the pad of his thumb, he traced my jawline. I pressed my cheek into his palm, let my eyes close.

He leaned in, rested his forehead against mine. His hands slid down my arms, stopping just above my hands. I turned my palms over so they hovered just under his touch.

My fingers tingled with the electricity.

I couldn’t explain the how or the why. I could just feel. The electricity. The magic.

He kissed me. A soul-searching, heart-pounding, all-out curl-a-girl’s-toes kind of kiss.

By the time we pulled apart, a small drumbeat of happiness was pulsing through me. I took a deep breath. It was now or never, a complete leap of faith. “Move in with me.”

There! I’d said it. And it hadn’t been all that hard, either. Maybe Mum and Dovie, Suz and Preston were right. It was meant to be.

Only … Only Sean wasn’t looking as happy as I thought he should.

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” he finally said.

I quickly grabbed a sponge and began wiping down the counters, scrubbing at invisible spots. Throwing the sponge in the sink, I turned on him. “Why isn’t it a good idea? You practically live here anyway. You have clothes here, a toothbrush, deodorant, your own shampoo, your favorite beer in the fridge, your own side of the bed, and books on the nightstand. Thoreau has food in the pantry, his own food bowls, and a doggy bed. Hell, you
already
live here—there’s no ‘practically’ about it.”

At the sound of his name, Thoreau lifted his head from his sunny spot on the floor and stared at us as if annoyed for waking him from his nap.

Sean smiled at me.

“Don’t you dare smile at me right now.” I jabbed him with a fingertip.

Trying to be serious, he pressed his lips together.

I folded my arms. “I don’t think this is funny.”

A strangled I-can’t-hold-it-in-any-longer laugh escaped him.

I picked up the sponge, eyed him, and squeezed it over his head.

Water dripped down his face. “Is that how it’s going to be?”

“Yes. Yes, it is. Smile at me, will you.”

He turned the water on in the sink. Picked up the sprayer.

“You wouldn’t,” I dared.

He tipped his soggy head to the side, his black hair curling at the tips, and sprayed me, a quick, freezing-cold blast. Water dripped down my nose, off my chin. My shirt was immediately soaked through.

Grendel watched us from the top of the fridge, his tail swishing back and forth as if we were great entertainment.

I grabbed for the sprayer, using hips and elbows to my advantage, and all the while water rained down on us as though we were caught in a spring shower.

Amused no longer, Grendel
rreowed
and made a run for it.

Sean held on tight, his laughter mixing with mine.

I lost my footing on the slippery floor and made a grab for his shirt. He caught my wrist, but I still fell onto my backside, my legs splaying out, taking his out from under him. He grabbed onto the counter to help break his fall, but the wood floor was too slippery and he fell backward, landing next to me.