Charley's Web (23 page)

“No, it wasn’t. I mean, I
do
have two children after all.” Whom her mother had graciously consented to look after until she got home.

“You have a date?” Elizabeth had inquired when Charley called her from the restaurant.

“It isn’t a date.”

“Of course it isn’t. Have a good time, darling.”

“Marriage was just never a high priority,” Charley told him. “I guess because of how miserable my parents’ marriage was.” She shrugged. “How about you?”

“I came close once. A few years back. Didn’t work out.”

They ate in silence for the next several minutes, Charley naked beneath the shirt Alex had been wearing before they made love. He was now bare-chested above a pair of jeans. She thought of asking him why his close call hadn’t worked out, then decided against it. The fact was he probably didn’t know. Who could really say why a relationship didn’t work? Weren’t there two sides to every story? Reality was subjective, truth a matter of opinion. The bottom line was that relationships either worked, or they didn’t.

“So, what’s next on the agenda?” he asked. “With regard to Jill’s book.”

“
My
book,” Charley corrected.

He smiled. “Sorry.
Your
book.”

“I thought I’d interview Jill’s old boyfriend.”

“Gary Gojovic,” Alex stated, carefully enunciating each hard syllable.

“You’re not a fan?”

“Gary’s testimony pretty well guaranteed Jill a seat on death row.”

“It was pretty damning,” Charley agreed. “That stuff about seeing Jill torturing a kitten…”

“Which she’s always denied.”

“Alex,” Charley reminded him, “she murdered three little children. Why would she have any problem torturing a cat?”

Alex tossed his fork to his plate. “Speaking of animals, how’s your little dog?”

Charley found herself suddenly smiling from ear to ear. “He’s great. So sweet. I come home, he’s waiting at the door. I sit down, he jumps into my lap. I leave the room, he follows me. If I disappear for two seconds, he’s so glad to see me when I get back, you’d think I’d been gone for years. I’m trying not to get too attached.”

“Sounds like you’re already hooked.”

“Yeah, well, there’s something very appealing about unconditional love. But I just have to keep reminding myself that he’s not my dog, and that pretty soon I’ll have to give him back.”

“To Glen McLaren,” Alex stated, tapping his fingers restlessly against the glass tabletop.

“Is there a problem?” Charley asked, sensing there was.

“How well do you know this guy?”

“Glen? Not very. But I consider him a friend,” Charley said. “I repeat, is there a problem?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

“What are you trying to say, Alex? It’s not like you to be so circumspect.”

“You have to understand that I wasn’t trying to pry. It was just that I thought his name sounded familiar, so I did a bit of snooping around. Turned out that, at one time, Glen McLaren had a financial interest in a couple of clubs in the Lauderdale area.”

“I know that. So?”

“So, did you know that one of the people who used to hang out at one of those clubs was a small-time drug dealer by the name of Ethan Rohmer?”

“What?”

“I found out Ethan was arrested one night trying to sell drugs to an undercover cop, although a smart lawyer got the charges dismissed.”

Charley tried to process what she was hearing. What did it mean? “Are you trying to tell me that Glen and Ethan are somehow involved?”

“I’m not trying to tell you anything. The truth is they might not know each other at all.”

“Just because Ethan was a regular at a club in which Glen had a financial stake says nothing other than…”

“…Ethan was a regular at a club in which Glen had a financial stake,” Alex agreed.

“It’s entirely possible the two men never met, that they weren’t even aware of each other’s existence.”

“Absolutely.”

“Kind of coincidental though, you have to admit.”

“It could be nothing. It’s
probably
nothing.”

“But you don’t think so,” Charley stated.

“I don’t know what to think,” Alex admitted.

“Shit.”

“It’s probably nothing,” Alex repeated.

Charley nodded.

“Just be careful, that’s all.” He came around the table, put his hands on her shoulders, began gently kneading the muscles at the back of her neck. “Can you stay the night?”

She shook her head. “No. I should be getting home.”

“I’ll follow you in my car,” he offered when she was dressed and at the door.

“No, that’s hardly necessary.”

“I insist.”

“Alex, really, I’ll be fine.”

“Don’t argue,” he said.

Charley smiled. She didn’t say it out loud, but this was one argument she was only too happy to lose.

H
er mother was sitting on the sofa, sound asleep,
Remember Love
open on her lap, Bandit dozing at her feet, when Charley tiptoed into the living room. “Mom,” she whispered gently, as the dog woke up and began jumping up and down with excitement. “Yes, hello, Bandit, hello. I’m glad to see you, too,” Charley said, realizing she was. “Mom,” she whispered again, slightly louder the second time, her right hand reaching toward her mother’s shoulder, stopping before she made contact. “I’m home.”

“Darling,” her mother said, opening her eyes and straightening her back. “How’d it go?”

“Good. Everything’s good.”

Her mother smiled, twisted her neck from side to side. “I must have dozed off. What time is it?”

“Almost eleven. You can sleep here tonight if you want.”

“Oh, no.” Elizabeth put the book on the coffee table, then pushed herself to her feet and stretched her arms high above her head, her fingers straining toward the ceiling. “I should get going.” She grabbed her bright red shawl from the back of the sofa, wrapping it across her shoulders as she walked toward the front door.

Charley thought she should probably try to convince her mother to stay, or at the very least, spend a few minutes with her inquiring about her day, but what she said was, “I’ll call you tomorrow.” Bandit stood at her feet, barking his good-byes as her mother climbed into her mauve Civic and drove off. “You have to do busy?” she asked the dog.

In response, Bandit ran to the nearest shrub and lifted his leg. “Amazing,” Charley marveled, as she always did. “Amazing,” she repeated, thinking it the perfect word to describe the day’s events. Not to mention the evening’s. She scooped the dog into her arms and walked down the hall toward her children’s bedroom, opening the door and peeking inside. “Sweet dreams, my beautiful angels,” she whispered before closing the door and continuing on to her room.

She undressed, remembering the measured way Alex had removed each item of her clothing, feeling his hands gentle on her breasts and buttocks, the touch of his lips on the side of her neck, the gentle probing of his fingers between her legs, the expert exploration of his tongue. God, if he was half as good in the courtroom as he was in the bedroom, he’d be as well-known as Clarence Darrow, she thought, recalling the law books that were stacked along the bottom of his living room walls, competing with an impressive collection of old movie classics. Otherwise, the condo wasn’t very different from the apartments of most men who lived alone, its elaborate stereo system pretty much overwhelming everything else—the brown leather sofa and matching chair that sat on the Mexican tile floor, a large TV and DVD player, along with an outdated VCR for those classic old movies. The paintings on the walls were more decorative than artful: a generic landscape, a bowl of green apples, a harbor full of sailboats.

The bedroom was another matter entirely. Here, gorgeous black-and-white photographs dominated the walls: a fully clothed couple lying on a stony beach, embracing behind a large umbrella, by Henri Cartier-Bresson; an exuberant sailor kissing a young woman in Times Square on D-day, by Robert Doisneau; a magnificent orchid in bloom by Robert Mapplethorpe; a Diane Arbus photo of two young sisters staring blankly into space; another picture of two women laughing exuberantly, their heads thrown back, their mouths open. “This is quite a collection,” she’d whispered, her eyes falling on the guitar that leaned against the side of the desk opposite the bed, the moon shining through the side window reflected in the glass of his computer screen. “Maybe you’ll play it for me later.”

“Later,” he’d said.

“After,” she’d whispered.

And they’d laughed.

Ultimately, Alex had begged off playing for her, claiming it was his ace in the hole, a way to guarantee she’d be back. Not much to worry about there, Charley decided now, groaning softly. “Amazing,” she whispered again, washing her face and brushing her teeth, then crawling into bed. Immediately Bandit folded his warm little body into the crook of her knees, and she fell sound asleep.

She dreamed she was chasing a large black umbrella across a field filled with flowers, Ethan Rohmer in hot pursuit, as several men in sailor suits stood on the sidelines cheering him on. She felt Ethan’s hot breath on the back of her neck, his fingers grabbing for her hair. She felt herself falling, saw Ethan’s shadow looming over her as he dragged her to her feet. “What do you want?” she pleaded as he began wrapping her in a bright red shawl. Except the man was no longer Ethan. He was Glen McLaren.

Charley woke up with a start, gasping for air. Bandit was immediately on his feet, licking the perspiration from her face and neck. “It’s okay. It’s okay, Bandit,” Charley told him, patting his head, trying to reassure them both. Already the dream was disappearing, evaporating like morning dew. She’d been chasing after something, she remembered, although she could no longer recall what that something was, and a group of sailors had been watching. Was that right? And then Ethan had grabbed her. Except it wasn’t Ethan. “It was Glen,” she stated out loud.

Glen McLaren had a financial interest in several clubs in the Lauderdale area.

So?

So, did you know that one of the people who used to hang out at one of those clubs was a small-time drug dealer by the name of Ethan Rohmer?

So? So what? What did it mean? Did it mean anything?

Charley lay awake, flipping from her left side to her right, then onto her back, where she stared up at the slowly spinning ceiling fan for the better part of an hour, trying to rid her mind of all conscious thought. Eventually she gave up on sleep altogether and went into the kitchen, Bandit following after her, where she made herself a cup of herbal tea. She carried it into the living room and plopped down on the sofa, wondering if Alex was awake, if he, too, was having trouble sleeping. She saw her sister’s novel on the coffee table and picked it up. Hell, she was living the damn thing, she thought. She might as well find out what to do next. Besides, the book had put her mother to sleep. With any luck, it would do the same thing for her.

Instead, Charley was up all night reading it. By 7
A.M
., she was on the final paragraphs.

Tiffany watched Blake leave. As always, she was struck by the steadiness of his gait, the sureness of his footing. She wondered where such confidence came from, and whether she would ever be able to experience it on her own, without Blake at her side, guiding her every move. Would he look back? she wondered, arranging her features into a brave smile in case he did. Would he remember the days they’d spent laughing, the nights they’d spent loving, the hours, the minutes, the seconds when she’d embraced him with every fiber of her being? Would he be haunted, as she knew she would be, by the memory of the love they’d once clung to, yet tended to so recklessly, and abandoned so carelessly?

“Remember, love,” she whispered as his shadow was absorbed by the night sky, and he disappeared from her sight forever. “Remember love.”

Charley snapped the covers of the book shut, wiping away a tear. “Oh, please. Tell me you’re not crying. Tell me you weren’t actually moved by that ridiculous nonsense. What’s happening to you?”

“Mommy?” Franny asked from the doorway. She was wearing a lilac-colored nightgown sprinkled with tiny pink ribbons, and sleep had styled her hair in an appealing array of tangles. “Is Grandma still here?”

“No, sweetie. She went home last night.”

“Then who are you talking to?”

Charley made a face. “Myself.”

Franny sank down on the sofa beside her mother. Bandit immediately jumped into her lap. “What about?”

“Your Auntie Anne’s book.” She tossed it on the cushion beside her.

“Is it good?”

“If I tell you something, will you promise never to tell another living soul?”

Franny nodded earnestly.

“I liked it.”

“Well, that’s okay, isn’t it?”

“I’m not sure.”

Franny nodded, as if she understood. “Grandma says Auntie Anne and Auntie Emily are coming to visit soon.”

“That’s right.”

“Will I get to see them?”

“Absolutely. We’re all going to have dinner together.”

“Will Grandma make her famous chicken?”

“I hadn’t thought about that yet. But we could ask her.”

“I think you should tell Auntie Anne you liked her book.”

“You do?”

“You always like it when people say nice things about your columns.”

“You’re right. How’d you get so smart anyway?”

“Elise says I take after Daddy,” Franny answered seriously.

“Does she,” Charley stated wearily. “What else does she say?”

“That she thinks I’m pretty.”

“Well, she’s certainly right about that.”

“And that you’ve done a really nice job with me.”

Charley couldn’t disguise the surprise in her voice. “She told you that?”

“I heard her talking on the phone to one of her friends. She said that you’ve done a really nice job with me and James, and she hoped she could do as good a job with Daniel.”

Once again, tears filled Charley’s eyes.

“Are you crying?”

Charley quickly wiped the tears aside with the backs of her hands. “I’m just tired.”

“I’ll take Bandit out to do busy,” Franny volunteered.

“Thank you, sweetheart. I’d appreciate that.”

Franny wrapped her arms around her mother’s neck, gave her a kiss on the cheek. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Remember love, Charley thought, and couldn’t help but smile.

“Ms. Webb’s residence,” the housekeeper announced.

“Can I speak to Anne, please. It’s her sister. Charley,” Charley added quickly, glancing at the clock beside her computer in her office at the
Palm Beach Post,
and noting that it was not quite nine thirty. Was Anne up this early? Did she work in the mornings? Would she be disturbing her? Was her sister even home, or had she already left on her tour? Charley grimaced, realizing how little she really knew about her sister’s life.

“Charlotte?” Anne asked seconds later. “Is everything all right?”

Why was that always the first question any of them asked each other, as if the only possible reason for calling was that something might be wrong? “Everything’s great. I read your book.”

“You did?”

“I liked it. I stayed up all night actually. Couldn’t put it down.”

“You sound surprised,” Anne remarked.

“No. Well, maybe yes, actually. But very pleasantly.”

“That’s good, I guess.”

“How are the kids?” Charley asked.

“Fine. Emily told you I’m letting A.J. have custody?”

“Do you really think that’s wise?”

“I guess we’ll find out in twenty years, when they write their tell-all books.”

“Are you sure about this, Anne? You told me A.J. was just using the kids to blackmail you for more alimony.”

“Yeah, well, I guess that plan didn’t work out the way he thought it would.”

“I really think you should reconsider….”

“And I really think this is none of your business.”

“Since when aren’t you my business?”

“Since a long time ago,” Anne reminded her.

“We’re still sisters,” Charley reminded her back.

“Okay, spare me the sentiment. This really isn’t like you, Charley. What’s going on?”

“Nothing’s going on. I just don’t want you to do anything you’ll regret. Like Tiffany in
Remember Love,”
she added, rolling her eyes. Had she actually just used her sister’s book as a reference point?

Anne laughed, as if reading Charley’s thoughts. “Look, there’s nothing for you to be concerned about. A.J.’s a great father. He’s much better with the kids than I am. He’ll take good care of them.”

“Like Dad took care of us?”

“Dad
did
take care of us, Charley. I mean, he might not have been the warmest person in the world…”

“Warm?” Charley interrupted. “He wasn’t even tepid!”

“He did the best he could.”

“He did the
least
he could.”

“You didn’t give him much of a chance.”

“I gave him every chance in the world. I’m not the one who cut off contact.”

“He felt betrayed, Charley.”

“How did I betray him? Because I agreed to see our mother after twenty years?”

“You’re still seeing her.”

“Why shouldn’t I? Why should I have to choose between them?” Charley asked.

“Because that’s the way it is.”

“It doesn’t have to be.”

“You didn’t give him any choice.”

“That’s ridiculous. We all have choices.”

“Right. You’ve made yours. He’s made his. And I’ve made mine. Can we just leave it at that?”

“Could you please just think about things a little more before you finalize anything?”

“Trust me, I’ve given the matter plenty of thought. I’m not abandoning my children, Charley. It’s not as if I’m running off to Australia,” she said pointedly.

Twenty years of sadness filled the space between.

“Okay,” Charley conceded.

“Please don’t worry about me. Everything’s terrific. My book is selling like hotcakes. I’ve just signed a multimillion-dollar deal for three more. My speaking tour’s a smashing success. Four hundred people turned up in Kansas City last week, which is, like, amazing.”

Amazing, Charley repeated, seeing Alex smile at her from a corner of her mind.

“And almost as many in Atlanta on Monday. I’m off to Denver tomorrow, then on to L.A. and San Francisco.”

“When will you be in Florida?”

“Looks like I’ll be in Palm Beach a week from Saturday, which I think is March the third. I’m probably also going to do a signing that afternoon, and my publicist is trying to nail down Sunday for the interview with
People.
And if you say ‘what people?’ I may have to shoot you.”

Charley scribbled the dates down. “Okay, so we’ll do dinner Saturday night?”

Silence.

“Anne? Dinner at my place Saturday night?”

“Fine,” Anne said curtly. “I’ll speak to you next week.”

“Take care,” Charley told her sister.

“You, too.”

Charley waited until her sister had disconnected before hanging up. She sat staring at the picture of her children on her computer screen for several minutes, trying to imagine voluntarily giving them up. It was impossible, she decided.