Dix Notch cocked his head, as if Dan and I on the screen were monkeys and he was simply curious about our primitive social rituals. “Mind explaining what happened here?”
I stopped to think, forming my words carefully since Mr. Notch tended to so easily misconstrue them.
“Dan was rubbing his hands with glee over the prospect of my best friend getting sued for all she was worth because Debbie Shatsky happened to drop dead in her salon. It was really nasty of him and I just couldn’t help myself. I saw his neck and I went for it.”
“Okay. I hear your anger. And I’m validating that.” He tented his fingers. This was a gesture he did a lot lately. I think it was Buddhist. Or maybe he was showing off his new male manicure. “But let me ask this, if I might. Do you always go about strangling your ex-husband?”
“He isn’t my ex,” I said. “He’s my fiancé.”
Notch’s eyelids fluttered. “I apologize. Perhaps I don’t have my listening ears on.”
Okay. What the heck were listening ears? Were they somehow different from regular ears? Maybe there were such things as “eating” ears or “seeing” ears.
“Do you mean to tell me, Bubbles,” he went on, “that the person you attacked today on the news, the man you’ve declared is an inveterate liar and . . . what was that you called him again?”
“Greasy, scum-sucking leech.”
“Yes. Hmm. Interesting choice of words. Anyway, this greasy, scum-sucking leech is going to be your husband?”
I tried to put a positive spin on it. “For our daughter’s sake. Our family counselor thinks she could do with the stability of a nuclear family.”
Notch pointed to the freeze-framed image of me with my hands around Dan’s neck. “I’d say that looks less like the foundation for a nuclear family and more like the foundation for a nuclear war, wouldn’t you?”
Nuclear war. If I had a nickel for every time someone had cracked that line since Dan and I got engaged, I’d have, oh, at least eighty-five cents.
An impossibly trim and healthy young woman stepped forward. She had long brown hair and flawless golden skin, and she wore stylish black pants that flared slightly at the bottoms. She couldn’t have been much older than Jane.
Notch turned to her and spread his arms wide. “Alison! I’m so glad you joined us. Have you met Bubbles Yablonsky?”
“Oh, my.” Alison reached out and gave my hand a bone-breaking squeeze. “I’ve read all your stories and heard so much about you.”
Aww, that was very sweet. My first fan. “Is she the intern replacing Justin?” I asked Notch.
“I should hope not. Alison Roach is a Columbia University Journalism School graduate, the kind of caliber I’ve been trying to recruit for some time.”
Alison the Columbia University journalism student beamed.
“She’s not Justin’s replacement,” he said, adding, “I hope someday she’ll be y
ours
!”
I blinked once and resolved not to convey my shock.
Never let ’em see you sweat
is my personal motto, second only to
Underwear is good
.
“Really? That’s nice.” I couldn’t have sounded more blasé.
“Isn’t that awesome?” Alison gushed, sliding a strand of hair behind her ear. “I mean, I wasn’t even looking for a job. Here I’d spent all summer hiking around Portugal and Spain with my girlfriends, and when I came back, I was so exhausted and, like, not really into the clock-punching trap. You know how that is.”
“Oh, sure.” In my dreams. At my house, not really into punching the clock means not really into eating food.
“Then one day when I was online, I saw this ad for a reporter at the
News-Times
and, well, I was getting pretty bored just sleeping late at home and I did need mad money to pay off the old Saks card. So here I am.”
She slapped the sides of her pants as though finding a job was, gee, as easy as making friends at Brownie camp.
Whereas I—not that I’m complaining—had had to bust my ass to get so much as an opportunity to write an obit for this rag. Working days shampooing down at the House of Beauty, attending eight years of night school at Two Guys Community College while playing single mother and raising Jane. And still Mr. Notch had been loath to bring me on full-time.
As for calling my salary “mad money”—don’t even get me started.
“That’s swell,” I said, wishing someone would explain what would be happening to me when Alison of the illustrious Columbia Journalism School took over my beat.
Then I had a revelation. Maybe Alison would be covering Mahoken Township. Hallelujah, because I was getting darned sick and tired of those Mahoken sewage council meetings. A girl can take only so much talk about hookups and flows.
“Listen,” Alison said, “I’d love to stick around, but I have an interview in two seconds and I have to rush. I just wanted to bring you up to speed on what I found out about latex allergies on the Internet.”
Now that was strange. It sounded like Alison was covering the Debbie Shatsky homicide.
“Ah, a reporter who actually researches. What a refreshing concept.” Mr. Notch touched Alison’s back in his new new age, touchy-feely way. “Why don’t we discuss this in my office? I have a pot of lemongrass herbal tea warming. We could sit on my yoga mat while you fill me in.”
Yes, good idea. I could tell them Debbie’s revelation that a woman named Marguerite, a client of her husband’s, was trying to get her claws in him. This was the kind of information that they call an “exclusive” in our business, though, being bighearted, I might let Alison work on the story with me. You know, to allow her some hands-on experience.
I was trotting after them when Notch held out his hand to stop me. “I meant Alison and me. You don’t have to join us, Bubbles. It’s not really necessary.”
Not necessary? That was ridiculous. Alison didn’t have the exclusive. I did. What exactly was going on?
“But I know all about her latex allergy,” I blurted.
Notch raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”
“And Debbie’s last words, about how a woman was after her husband.”
Instead of exclaiming,
Why didn’t you say so? Step into my office right away,
he said, “Really, Bubbles? Then let me read your notes.”
Damn Notch and his stupid hang-up about notes. Who remembers to carry around a little pad and pen, anyway? You think leopard-print leotards have pockets? “I don’t have notes, not technically,” I bluffed. “Besides, I wasn’t reporting anything. I’d been doing hair extensions.” What a pathetically lame excuse!
Mr. Notch did not seem persuaded. He did that odd thing he’d been doing lately, closed his eyes and murmured some prayer for “strength” and “serenity.” And then he inhaled and exhaled several times.
“I believe I’ve warned you,” he said with exaggerated patience, “about the need to take notes—in any situation. My word, Alison probably learned that while reporting for the newspaper at her elementary school.”
What, five years ago?
“It’s true,” Alison chirped. “I did.”
“Now why don’t you stick to your regular beat, Bubbles? I haven’t decided who will write this story, you or Lawless, but when I do, you’ll be either the first or the second to know.”
He took Alison by the arm like a true gentleman and was about to lead her into his office when I couldn’t stand it anymore. I had to know.
“If Alison’s supposed to replace me, does that mean I’m being promoted to courts like you promised?”
Notch turned and cleared his throat. “Actually, I’ve had to put off your promotion, Bubbles, what with you going on your honeymoon next week and the holidays and all.”
Honeymoon. I didn’t know if you could call an overnight in the Hotel Lehigh a honeymoon. When I think of honeymoons, I think high class. I think of the Poconos. Champagne bubble baths. Heart-shaped beds. Sex. And though Dan refused to believe me, we wouldn’t be having any of that.
As I had made quite clear to him, if he wanted sex, he’d have to visit the hookers on Fourth Street like all the other lawyers in town. After I’d rolled around on the sheets with Stiletto, no other man would do for me.
Sex with Stiletto. All reality suspended as I recalled the way Stiletto liked to come up behind me, slipping his strong arms around my waist, pushing aside my hair and kissing the part of my neck right under my ear. There was no stopping us once that started. He’d spin me around and, at first, kiss me gently on the lips and then, his hands roving where they damned well pleased, pull me to him harder, his kisses more intense, his jeans straining in a certain alluring way.
That reminded me of that night in Amish country when he cornered me in the parking lot and lifted me onto the hood of a car in the rain and . . . Why, it was like yesterday. I could still hear him saying my name as if he were whispering it in my ear at this very moment.
“Bubbles?”
There was a tap on my shoulder.
I opened my eyes and found I was staring straight into his blue ones. There he was in his leather bomber jacket over a black T-shirt. His face was a little leaner, more tan. There was a slight bit of stubble over his strikingly square jaw and a few strands of gray in his blackish-brown hair. But it couldn’t be. Stiletto was in England. He’d left weeks ago to take over the London bureau for the Associated Press.
His lips parted in a cocky grin. “Surprised you, didn’t I?”
Oh my God. It
was
him.
“Sti—” I was about to throw my arms around his gorgeous neck when I spied my news editor, Mr. Salvo, standing off to the right, shaking his head ever so slightly.
Right. Stiletto wasn’t mine anymore. We were over. I bit my lip and stuck out my hand. “Hi, Steve.”
He furrowed his brows. “Hi, Steve? What kind of crap is that?” Then he bent down and kissed me smack on the lips in front of the whole newsroom.
That was Stiletto for you.
“God, you taste good,” he murmured, reaching behind to pull me to him for what I suspected would be another, deeper foray.
“Ahem.” Mr. Salvo parted us like a referee. “This is a place of business.”
“Your point being?” Stiletto said.
“No making out in the newsroom.”
Stiletto frowned. “We weren’t making out. I was simply being friendly, greeting a colleague with whom I’d worked on many tough and rewarding stories, right, Bubbles?”
I tried not to smile. “Right. I mean, two people who survive a mine explosion have this kind of relationship, Mr. Salvo.” I didn’t feel it necessary to explain
how
Stiletto and I had ended up in the mine to begin with or what we’d been doing and why the word “shaft” had more than one meaning in this context, not to mention explosion.
“That wasn’t the only tunnel.” Stiletto’s eyes twinkled. “Remember the night we explored the cave off the Monocacy?”
The cave that led to the Sun Inn,
I thought dreamily. My legs got that warm, liquid sensation as I recalled Stiletto taking me to bed for the first time, carrying me to the four-poster and laying me down before slowly unbuttoning his white shirt.
“That was one of our more, uh,
rigorous
assignments,” he said.
“Okay, cut it out, you two.” Mr. Salvo pushed us farther apart. “You’re making me blush and I’ve been a news editor for over twenty years. Besides, aren’t you getting married this weekend, Bubbles?”
“Details,” Stiletto said.
But Mr. Salvo was right and I knew it. I had to stick with the game plan for Jane. I took a deep breath, cooled off and said, “What are you doing here anyway, Stiletto?”
Mr. Salvo answered for him. “Stiletto flew back from London to attend the Help the Poor Children fund-raiser at the Masonic temple tonight.”
“All the way from England for a rubber-chicken dinner?”
Stiletto shrugged. “What can I say? I’m a generous guy.”
“Help the Poor Children is the pet project of his new girlfriend,” Mr. Salvo said, unable to hide the hint of victory in his voice.
Mr. Salvo and Stiletto were old friends who went way back. Mr. Salvo had always been the ugly duckling to Stiletto’s swan, and so it had been Mr. Salvo who first advised me against dating Stiletto on the theory that I’d get my heart broken.
My heart hadn’t been broken. It had been delicately placed between two pieces of waxed paper and pounded into a quarter of an inch.
“Yes,
girlfriend
.” Mr. Salvo stressed. “An actress, no less. From Allentown.”
I looked to Stiletto for confirmation. Was this true? Could Stiletto have actually stooped so low as to date a woman from—spare me—Allentown?
“Her name is Sabina Towne,” Stiletto said calmly. “We met in London, introduced by mutual friends. She was in
The Cherry Orchard
. She’s a lovely person. And yes, Tony’s correct. She’s originally from Allentown.”
“Oh, Stiletto,” I said, emphasizing my disappointment. How could Stiletto date a girl from Allentown? Allentown is Lehigh’s rival city. Lehigh is to steel as Allentown is to pork products. Nothing in common. For a Lehigh boy to date an Allentown girl was like a Shark dating a Jet. A Hatfield a McCoy. A McDonald dating a Burger King. It was unnatural. It defied the laws of the universe.
“You should meet her. If you came to the fund-raiser tonight, you could.” Stiletto kept his gaze on me. I had the feeling he wasn’t interested one little bit in me meeting Sabina.
“No can do, old boy,” Mr. Salvo said. “Bubbles has to cover the Mahoken council meeting tonight. They got a proposed development going up with a pretty tricky sewage issue, yes, sirree. Screams B1 all the way.”
Stiletto chuckled. “Yeah. I love it when Bubbles goes all the way.”
I swallowed. Awful, naughty schemes popped into my mind. Okay. I was going to that stupid fund-raiser, come Mahoken hell or its dirty high water. “Who is covering the Help the Poor Children fund-raiser, anyway?” I asked.
“Flossie Foreman for ‘Talk of the Town.’ ” Mr. Salvo nodded to Flossie, a joweled old lady who wore so much pancake that she left powdery stains on her chair.