Bad Girls Finish First (14 page)

“The only reason I fired them was because you weren't man enough to do it!”

Michael's eyes flashed, and he abruptly let go of Raven's arm, put both hands in his pockets and took several steps backward. “I suggest,” he said evenly, “that you stay the hell out of my sight for the rest of the day.”

Raven wasn't ready to leave—she thought of half a dozen insults, any one of which would have taken their argument to a new low, but the brutality in Michael's eyes unnerved her. “Fine with me. I've got too much to do today to be bothered with you anyway.”

 

 

“I could've been like you,” Michael mused.

“What do you mean?”

Michael rubbed his eyes with his fists. “Happily married. How long have you and Mary been together?”

“Thirty years, just about,” Dudley said vaguely. As soon as he had finished high school, Dudley rushed out and married the only girl who would have him.

“Come next month, Grace and I would've celebrated twenty-three years together.”

“You fell in love with someone else. It happens.”

Michael stood near the window that provided his favorite view of Austin. His kingdom. “But the price,” he said as he looked into the distance, seeing nothing. “I heard from David that Grace hasn't been the same since the divorce. When we split, I didn't give much thought to how it would affect her. I was, you know, trying to get to Raven. She was the only person on my mind.”

He turned to Dudley. “And my new wife. Half the time I can't think straight, always worried about what Raven—aah.” Michael stopped himself, because he'd learned that complaining about Raven was a waste of time.

“Evan's got problems, did you know that?” Michael asked. “He has Grace's sensitive temperament.”

Dudley didn't reply.

“When he was younger, I was busy with other things. Now this race sucks up all my time. I missed Evan's city-choir audition and Grace didn't show up, either. Christopher was the only one there. A big brother, taking the parents' place. It's not right.”

“You would've been there if you could've,” Dudley said. He'd said the same thing to Michael hundreds of times: “You would have (Dudley would fill in the blank with whatever the situation called for) if you could have.”

“Look at your life,” Michael continued. “Still married to your high-school sweetheart. One daughter at Yale, another married with a baby on the way.”

Dudley's daughter was at Harvard, not Yale, and his youngest grandson was a month old. He'd told Michael about his birth, but Dudley himself couldn't care less about the little bastard, so what did it matter?

“At least Chris is doing fine,” Dudley said.

“Fifty-percent success rate, is that acceptable for a father? But you're right, Chris is a good kid. A better man than I was at his age.” Michael looked uplifted. “He'll make a name for himself and someday he's going to be a good husband and father. He's going to outshine me, and for that I'm thankful.”

While Michael boo hooed on Dudley's shoulder, Raven was in her own office, opening her mail. She was so angry that her hands shook. Michael hadn't ever hit a woman, and although she knew he'd never hit her, no matter how far she went, his roughness rattled her. It made her feel like he was the one in control.

The first thing she opened was a card from her mother, Jacqueline. She'd seen a picture of Raven and Michael in the
San Diego Union-Tribune
. Had Raven put on weight, her mother wanted to know. Why was she standing so awkwardly, and what was wrong with her hair? Raven ripped up the note and put it in the trash can. She closed her eyes and felt the familiar hunger, the emptiness that had gnawed at her insides since she was a girl. Her impulse was to eat to the point of nausea, purge, and hurt someone, in that order. Never one to deny herself whatever her body craved, she took a bag of Dove bars from the back of her bottom drawer (where she tried to hide it from herself) and began the process.

As she ate the chocolate, Raven went through the rest of her mail. This time she started with the invitations. As she read invitation after invitation, Raven regained her composure. All these people—the Texarkana Chamber of Commerce, the Wichita Falls Philanthropic Society, 100 Black Women of Houston—wanted her. By the time Raven got to the tenth envelope, she was no longer gripping the letter opener like it was a weapon. She shoved the bag of Dove bars back into its hiding place, leaned back, crossed her legs, and assured herself that she wasn't fat or awkward as Jacqueline's note implied. How could she be? She was the future governor's wife.

David is a tough nut to crack,
Raven thought as she enjoyed yet another lunch with him. He managed to have lunch with her once a week, and from the start, Raven enjoyed their conversations. One minute she flirted with him and the next they commiserated like old friends. They talked about everything from world events and economics to movies and hip-hop culture.

As they finished their meal, Raven boldly went out on a limb. “I probably shouldn't say this, but we ignite a spark when we're together. Remember the first time we had lunch? And that night in the Lufkin hotel lobby? Whew. Have you noticed?” she asked. Raven was surprised to find that she felt shy. “What do you think it means and what should we do about it?”

“It means we click,” David replied. “We shouldn't read more into it than that.”

“I'm not reading anything into it, David, and you know it.” Raven challenged him. “Are you denying that you're attracted to me?”

“No,” David quietly said. “I can't deny that you're incredibly intriguing to me.”

Raven threw up her hands in exasperation. “Okay, then what's the problem? I'm not saying we need to do anything drastic, but if you're feeling me, David, you could at least show it.”

David grabbed her hand across the table. He was completely confident and at ease because he was doing what he did best, providing moral guidance to a confused soul. “Ever heard of one thing leading to another? If we were to start acting like more than just friends, the next thing you know we might decide to act on our feelings. I don't want that to happen and neither do you. It would be wrong, Raven.”

She sighed. “So, just friends?”

“The best,” David said.

“Let me get this one,” he said when the check came.

“Oh, no, you got the last one,” Raven said. She quickly added, “But if you insist, go right ahead.”

It was their private joke. Raven let David know early on that she didn't believe a woman should ever pay for anything. “The pleasure of our company ought to be enough,” she had said. David told her that her attitude was old-fashioned, but he liked it a lot.

As they left the restaurant, David's hand brushed against Raven's bare skin. The electricity between them had been hot enough to burn down a brick house.

“Come here,” she said and pulled David into the empty coatroom.

Raven kissed him, and he kissed her back, briefly, passionately. She felt him rise, but when Raven reached for David's crotch, he pulled away, leaving her standing there with her eyes closed and arms groping for him, like a blind woman.

“David, I don't get you. Why won't you just go with the feeling? Is it because of Michael?”

“In part, but mainly because it would be wrong.” David didn't feel as sure of himself as he had moments before. As much to reassure himself as to get Raven in check, he said, “We're both adults. We can be friends without letting our hormones take over.”

“That's not what your kiss just said.” Raven moved toward David again. He grabbed her hand, but then disappointed her by leading her out of the coatroom.

“Let me walk you to your car.”

As David closed her car door, Raven looked up and said to him, “You say one thing, David, but the fire in your eyes tells another story.”

“Maybe so,” David admitted. He was still so rock hard that it hurt. “But this is one story that won't end the way you want it to.”

14

G
race, concentrating on picking bruise-free tomatoes from the grocery bin, didn't notice the woman standing near the onions. The woman waited until Grace turned so that she could get a better view of her face, then she rushed forward.

“Grace? Grace, girl! I thought that was you!” Before Grace could react, the woman reached out and hugged her.

“Hi, Carolyn. You're looking great.” Grace was right. Carolyn, almost six feet tall, was one solid sister. Carolyn had been thick and curvy when they were in college, and now she was even thicker. She was still curvy too, and showing it. Carolyn had on tight black pants that gripped her huge behind and a low-cut bright orange blouse that her double-D-cup breasts all but popped out of. She had on diva lashes and wore her natural hair twisted. Carolyn's look matched her personality, outsized in every way. Neither Carolyn's disposition nor her fashion sense were for everybody to emulate or to like, but they worked for her.

“Thanks, hun. I'm feeling good, too,” Carolyn said.

Grace looked down at her own baggy sweats and sneakers. No wonder Carolyn didn't return the compliment.

“How's Jimmy?” Grace asked.

Carolyn waved one jeweled hand dramatically. “Girl, that fool is fine, last I heard from him. You know he quit me for a woman who works at the car wash around the corner from our house.” Carolyn's big grin never wavered.
“My
house, I should say.”

Grace put her hand on Carolyn's arm. “I'm sorry, I hadn't heard. I know how hard it is.”

“It was in the beginning. I kept trying to figure out what I did wrong. I look good, I've got a good job, and like Betty Wright said, I was a mother to the children and you-know-what in the sheets.” Carolyn had started out serious, but by the time she finished her sentence, she was smiling again. “What could a man want with a bone like that car wash girl when he had a juicy, thick T-bone steak like me at home?”

Grace tsk-tsked, and started to say something, but Carolyn kept on talking.

“And you know what I said to myself? Who gives a damn! I mean, really, Jimmy's stupid as hell anyway, so he went and did some more stupid shit—so what!”

Other shoppers were starting to look at them and Grace was getting a little self-conscious, but she wanted to hear more. In the back of her mind she'd always believed that Michael left her because she was boring, couldn't hold a candle to Raven when it came to excitement. But here was Carolyn, sexy, vibrant, and larger than life, saying that Jimmy dumped her. Men didn't leave women like Carolyn, they only left women like Grace, or so Grace had thought.

“I'm not handling my divorce so well, Carolyn,” Grace blurted out.

Carolyn cocked her head to one side and looked at Grace. “I can see that.” Suddenly she interlocked her arm with Grace's and said, “Come on, girl, I'm taking you to lunch.”

“But what about our groceries?”

“This store will be here when we get back,” she said as she and Grace walked out of the store. “Besides, grocery stores don't sell the kind of nourishment you need.”

Grace and Carolyn went to a Thai restaurant across the street from the store. Carolyn promptly ordered for both of them: white wine, spring rolls, and hot fish.

“How did you do it?” Grace asked as she looked out the window.

“Do what?”

“Become happy again, find your joy.”

“You're talking about two different things, Grace. When Jimmy walked out, it made me unhappy. I was so hurt—I can't put into words how hurt I was. But my joy? He never touched that.” Carolyn patted her chest. “Joy is mine, and Jimmy—nobody, for that matter—can take it from me.”

Grace felt a tear slip down her face. “Michael took my happiness and my joy. He walked off with my children, with my whole life.”

“Michael doesn't have anything that belongs to you, Grace. Everything that's yours, you've still got. Your joy and happiness are buried, and you're refusing to dig them up.”

“So it's my fault, is that what you're saying?” Grace angrily asked. “That's not true. I'm not going to sit here and listen to you blame me. I put my soul into saving my marriage.”

Grace moved to stand, but Carolyn grabbed her hand. “Sit down, Grace. You're mad and that's a good thing. But it's time to move beyond the anger and the hurt and do something.”

Grace wilted and said miserably, “I don't know what to do. I'm not like you, Carolyn. I don't bounce back as easily. I still feel beaten down by what I've been through.”

“Just because you feel beaten down doesn't mean you have to look it,” Carolyn said. “When you were going through tough times, battling to hold on to Michael, you looked liked a star.”

Grace looked surprised. “You knew?”

“Of course, sweetie, we all did. But you didn't want to talk about it, so we didn't say anything.” Carolyn ordered them both another glass of wine. She added more Thai pepper to her dish, and enjoyed a few bites before she went on. “I remember running into you once, right when things were really bad with you and Michael. You had on a royal blue St. John suit and a pair of two-toned patent shoes. I still remember those shoes.” Carolyn shook her head as she recalled the moment. “You were fabulous.”

Grace didn't remember the suit Carolyn was talking about but she was sure it was in her closet, way in the back. Most things about that time in her life were a blur, but she vaguely recalled that she had looked outstanding.

“Even if you don't feel good, you've got to look good.” The wine had gotten to Carolyn, and it took her back to her roots. “We're South Oak Cliff girls who moved to ritzy North Dallas. But no matter where we live,
this
”—she made an up and down motion toward Grace's sweat suit ensemble—“is
not
how we roll.”

Carolyn dug a fifty out of her handbag and put it on the table. “Come on. We're going shopping, and I don't mean for groceries.”

 

 

“Genie, will you grab me a beer?”

“Already got that covered,” she said as she walked into the room with two cold beers and paper plates.

Christopher opened the pizza box that sat on the coffee table in front of them. He fixed Genie's plate, then his, while she flipped through TV channels.

“The preseason game between the Patriots and the Eagles should be on,” Christopher said as he took a swig of beer.

“Here it is,” Genie said. She laid the remote on her TV tray and bit into a slice of pizza. “Hey,” she said to Chris. “Slow down, you're halfway through your second slice already! We should've ordered two.”

He ended up eating twice the number of slices Genie ate. As Christopher went into Genie's kitchen to get two more beers, he said over his shoulder, “Your boss has been in rare form lately, hasn't she?”

“For sure. That staff meeting was pretty intense.”

Chris sat down next to Genie. “Whenever I think she's hit her limit, that she can't possibly do anything more outrageous than some of the things she's already done, she surprises me.”

Genie placed one leg on the sofa, knee bent, and turned so that she faced Christopher. “Shouldn't have been a big surprise. Those guys had been screwing up for months, especially Pete. I couldn't believe he had the nerve to question Raven's decision.”

“Well, honey, it wasn't her decision to make and Pete knew it. Key staffers shouldn't be fired without my father's say-so, and it was obvious that Raven hadn't consulted him beforehand.”

“Thank goodness for that,” Genie said dryly.

Chris stared at Genie. “What's that supposed to mean?”

Genie put her hand on Christopher's arm. “Chris, I don't mean any harm, you know that. But your father was . . . hesitant . . . to tackle the problem, even though he'd been told umpteen times that it needed to be done. Heck, he's said it himself. It's a good thing Raven took charge, that's all I'm saying. There's no telling how many more endorsements we would've lost if she hadn't stepped in and let them go.”

“Whatever. Let's see what else is on TV,” Christopher said, and reached across Genie to get the remote.

Christopher lay back and Genie reclined in his arms. They watched a silly sitcom, and Christopher found his good mood restored.

“This is cool, just the two of us spending private time together. Guess we better enjoy it while it lasts,” Christopher said.

“You planning on going somewhere?”

“No. I'm talking about this phase of our relationship, when we don't have anything else to worry about. It's great. How long are we going to be able to sit in front of the TV and eat off paper plates?”

Genie shrugged. It wasn't a big deal to her. “For as long as we want to, I suppose.”

Christopher hesitated, then plunged in. “Well, I don't want my kids sitting on the floor with their paper plates on the coffee table, yelling, ‘Hey, Mom, bring me some more juice.'”

Genie had been looking at TV and half-listening to Christopher but now she gave him all her attention. “Kids?”

“Don't get it twisted, Miss Dupree, I'm just talking. No way am I ready for diaper detail.” Christopher cautiously felt his way forward. “But we've got something special, Genie, I recognize that. Things are going good, we've got Dad on track, for the most part.” Christopher went for the gold. “I think we ought to start thinking about the future. At least about getting engaged.”

Genie abruptly sat up. “I'm in no hurry, Chris. Getting engaged, marriage, children—maybe all that will come in time. I love you, but I love me, too, and I love my life right now, just the way it is. A demanding career, my own space—those are the things I've dreamed about since the day I graduated from high school.”

She sounds like I'm talking about putting her in prison
, he thought. “You're older than me, Genie, I just assumed you'd be on the fast track when it comes to planning for the future.” Although Christopher had been nervous about bringing up marriage, this wasn't the reaction he expected. Wasn't a woman supposed to be happy—overjoyed—when a man made up his mind to take their relationship seriously?

“I don't want to rush through my life.” She lay against him again and added, “And you shouldn't want to rush through yours, either. You're way too young to be thinking about starting a family.”

One of the reasons Christopher loved Genie was because she knew her own mind and wasn't afraid to speak it. But those same traits annoyed him, too, when Genie turned dismissive. “I don't know about all that,” Christopher replied in a cautious tone. He wasn't in the mood for a debate. “My parents married when they were young.”

“We see what a huge success that was,” Genie quipped.

This time Christopher was the one to sit up, all but shoving Genie off him.

She put her hand over her mouth and said, “I'm sorry, Chris, that didn't come out the right way.”

“No problem,” Christopher said. He burrowed into the sofa and finished his beer. Genie tried to strike up a new conversation but Christopher wouldn't bite. Finally he put his hands on his knees and pushed himself up. “I think I'll tackle that environmental commission report tonight.”

“Is it in your car?” The authority in her voice was gone, replaced by worry.

“No. At my apartment.”

“But I thought you were spending the night.”

As Christopher put on his jacket, he gave Genie a look she didn't like, a look she'd seen his father toss at Raven, and said, “I wouldn't want to encroach on your space. Maybe some other time.”

 

 

Dudley had hoped that putting Raven in charge of the faith-based initiative would keep her out of his way, but he was wrong. She ran the staff meetings and placed calls to key legislators and lobbyists without consulting him first. He kicked his plan to get the goods on Raven into high gear. He started by visiting an acquaintance at Monroe School of Law.

The man who was director of admissions was not happy to have Dudley drop by his office. “I can't give you information from student files. That's a crime!”

“Calm down, Crawford, I don't want anything out of the files, at least not yet,” Dudley assured the man. Crawford was a married man on the down low. Dudley had so much dirt on Crawford that the poor man would have given Dudley the key to the student files if Dudley had asked.

Dudley tried to get his squat body comfortable in the cheap chair in Crawford's office. “I want to find out what you know about Raven, Senator Joseph's wife.”

Crawford lit up. The scandal that Raven left in her wake hadn't been forgotten. “That Raven was something else,” he said as he closed his office door. “She had her little clique: Callie Stephens, a guy name Keith something, and Omar Faxton,” Crawford explained. “When you saw Raven, you saw Callie, but Raven was the queen bee. Top of her class, beautiful, and screwing a powerful man.”

Rather than sit behind his desk Crawford took the seat next to Dudley. “Everyone got along fine as long as Raven was the lead pony, but when Callie pulled out front by proving herself an awesome litigator, Raven decided to get rid of her.” Crawford spread his hands in the air as he painted an imaginary picture. “Now get this. Omar and Callie had a thing: she called it love but Omar didn't love anybody but himself.” Crawford paused and arched his brows at Dudley. “You should have seen him. Fine as shit. What I wouldn't have done—”

“Crawford! You know I can't stand that faggot talk!” Dudley barked. “Get back to the story!”