Authors: Tara McTiernan
Bianca smiled. "Chelsea. I was wondering about you."
"I'm sorry I'm late? Is Edie and her date here yet?"
"No, but
your
date is. Come on, let's not keep him waiting," Bianca said, opening the door wider and then walking with Chelsea through the foyer toward the back of the house. "Beautiful dress, by the way."
"Thanks! I think it's a knockoff of yours?"
"Oh?" Bianca said, eyebrows going up as she turned and scanned Chelsea while they crossed through the living room. "I didn't know they made knockoffs of this dress. Well, don't try to tell me that emerald isn't real. I can tell in a hot second. Very nice. Who gave it to you?"
Chelsea felt a flutter of panic run through her. Bianca could tell? Who gave it to her? Think quickly! "Oh, an old boyfriend? You like it?"
Bianca paused just before the glass door leading outside to the terrace and regarded Chelsea with razor-sharp eyes. "An old boyfriend, huh? Interesting. Come on, you've got to meet Aaron. He's all that and a bag of tricks. You'll love him."
But Chelsea did not love Aaron, not one little bit. Right away, the tall handsome blond stockbroker was offhand with her, barely looking at her when he greeted her in a bored tone. Where was the leering admiration she'd been expecting? Instead, he seemed to be fixated on Bianca, his blue eyes glued to her.
Chelsea felt like yelling, "Fine! I didn't want you anyway!" but knew instinctively that, even if she did something that outrageous and dismissive, he still wouldn't care. Evidently, Aaron was smitten with his colleague's wife. Chelsea keenly felt the irony of the situation, wanted to laugh at herself, but also felt the old jealousy sitting right next to her common sense in her head, commenting that Bianca would always win, that Chelsea would always take a back seat.
Chelsea accepted her strawberry daiquiri from Lintang and forced herself to make small talk until Edie and her latest boyfriend, Stuart, arrived, which was ten minutes later and ten minutes too long. In the interim, Bianca kept examining Chelsea from her perch, a large ornate wicker chair that was like a throne, Aaron stared at Bianca, Kate and Grant were as lovey-dovey as a couple could be, piercing Chelsea with envy, and John, the man who wouldn't commit to her, kept casting angry glances in her direction.
Grateful for the distraction of Edie and Stuart's arrival, Chelsea lavished them with attention and introduced them around, everyone smiling and nodding and saying nice to meet you, including John, who had never met Edie in person. When Chelsea saw that Aaron was friendlier even with the newly arrived couple than he was with her, she couldn't take it another second. Why had she come? Why hadn't she realized what a disaster tonight would be?
She stood up. "Excuse me. I have to go to the powder room."
Bianca looked her way again and John studiously looked down at his drink. Chelsea flashed a smile at everyone and then hurried away. Just a breather, she just needed a chance to get her nerve back up. Then she'd get through this night and it would be over, only a bad memory.
She went to the bathroom near the foyer entrance, closed the door behind her, and leaned back against the door to take a deep breath. Just as she was about to step away from the door, it shook under a pounding fist.
Jumping away as if scalded, Chelsea cried, "I'll be right out!"
"It's me. Let me in. Quick," John whispered urgently on the other side of the door.
Chelsea startled and then hurried to unlock the door before anyone saw them. John slipped in and locked the door behind him before turning toward her. Wrapping his arms around her, he pushed her up against the wall.
"What?" she said.
"You," he whispered, taking her face in his hands and kissing her deeply.
She kissed him back, feeling herself grow aroused.
Suddenly he pulled away, pushing her shoulders painfully against the white marble of the bathroom wall. "You're mine. Do you understand? Mine. Not that idiot Aaron's."
Wincing with pain as John crushed her shoulders under his hands, Chelsea felt an impotent rage well up inside of her and let it spill out of her mouth. "Then make me yours! Leave her! So what about the money? I don't care anymore. Let's just be together, really together."
John narrowed his eyes. "I'm not letting her take it, what I made, not letting her take my son. Wait. Just wait."
"I won't wait forever, John!" she whispered hotly. "You'll have to let me go!"
"Never," he said, pushing her even harder against the wall until her whole body seemed to be cracking under the pressure.
Then they heard a woman calling, "John? John!" It was Bianca.
John gave Chelsea one last shove against the wall and released her, opening the door and leaving Chelsea to crumple to the bathroom floor, bruised and wanting and alone.
Mojito
Bianca sat at the head of the table in their black and white dining room, cool sea breezes coming through the open windows and pushing the white sheer curtains so that they rippled. Her dream was coming true. Everything was going exactly to plan.
Mixing the rotten oysters into the bouillabaisse had been too easy. She simply dumped them out of the slimy stained paper bag they were in, stirred so that they blended with the rest of the ingredients, re-sealed the lid, put the pot on the range, and then went to find Lintang. Bianca had waited by the kitchen door for twenty minutes to make sure she'd be there when Lucie arrived and that no one else would get in the way. John was still showering and Lintang was easy: Bianca told her that the upstairs carpet needed a run with the vacuum and, while she was up there, to keep an eye on the new nanny, Tiffany.
Tiffany was doing fine, happy to have a paying job now that she didn't work at Grant's practice anymore. She was hopeful, too, as Bianca had lied to Tiffany about finding her another administrative job, asking if she could pitch in meanwhile with Sebastian. Bianca was between nannies currently and needed a hand. Camilla had been caught stealing. Well, Bianca planted her own jewelry in Camilla's bureau drawer and then she and John confronted her and "found" it, but still. They had to get rid of her. And now, Bianca had suck-up moral-free Tiffany with the brains of a toadstool at her disposal. She was perfect.
Lucie had just cleared the salad course, which Bianca had dug into hungrily after simply playing with her soup. She remembered the odd look Lucie had given her when she'd come to clear that course and found Bianca's soup untouched. Bianca, feeling high after watching everyone empty their bowls, had wanted to laugh at Lucie's naive confusion. Instead, she had cut her eyes away and pressed her lips together to keep from giggling. Later, after everything, she would admit it tasted off, that she couldn't eat it. She could hardly be blamed considering the massacre that would unfold tonight as a result of Lucie's poor hygiene practices.
Bianca averted her eyes again now as Lucie placed a plate with the main course - duck breast, potatoes and haricort vert - in front of her. After Lucie had moved around the table, putting the plates before all of Bianca's guests, and then left the room, Bianca allowed herself to look up. Everyone was clearly having a wonderful time, chattering and sipping from their wine glasses. Even Grant, who was drinking from his roofie-spiked glass like a good boy. In fact, Bianca was happy to see that he'd almost finished it and looked flushed and a little wild-eyed. So soon he would be hers. All she had to do was wait and watch for the first green face. The others would follow swiftly. Those raw oysters were really bad.
She smiled over the candles and small flower arrangements that marched down the center of the table at John, who sat at the opposite end. John looked up from his duck and hesitantly smiled back, looking almost cowed. Good, look guilty, she thought. In a week, you'll look even more so, the cheating husband murdered by his suicidal mistress.
Actually, the whole thing worked out in the end. Chelsea knew too much about Bianca's role in Jenna Butler's murder back in high school. Chelsea may still have believed that Bianca did it for her, but it was too dangerous for her to know anything at all. It had been Bianca's first murder of a human being and it had turned out to be much harder to get away with than anything else she had ever done.
Studying bomb-making had been the easy part; Bianca had, after all, a quick mind in spite of what her lackluster academic record reported. The hard part was all of the variables that were tough to control, like witnesses. In the end her father had stepped in, but there had been a high price to pay at the convent. Bianca may have had to learn the hard way but the lesson was set in stone now: murder was incredibly difficult to pull off. So, you saved it for something worthwhile, not taking a huge risk on some some silly bitch who'd only been trying to steal your boyfriend.
Now, when it came to Chelsea and John, they were worth it. Get rid of John and get all his money, and while she was at it, remove problematic Chelsea. Bianca was still amazed how easy it was to find out about the two of them, how blatant they had been. All she had to do was a tiny bit of digging, checking his phone while he was in the shower, logging on to his home computer with its obvious password "Sebastian", following him one day in a cheap rental car while wearing a wig and sunglasses. It was a piece of cake. Like tonight. Still, she felt like playing with them a little, seeing them squirm.
"Chelsea, I have to say that I just can't keep my eyes off your necklace! It's simply gorgeous," Bianca purred. "Don't you think so, Edie?"
Chelsea looked up with alarm, still mid-chew, while Edie, a plump woman in her forties with frizzy brown hair and a ready smile, swallowed and looked at Chelsea's neck with interest. "Oh, yes. Beautiful. Is that real?"
Bianca let out a tinkling laugh. "Of course it is. Trust me, I know my jewelry. That had to be quite a boyfriend you had, Chelsea. And to think I've never even seen it before. You've got to wear it more often."
Chelsea only nodded, wide eyed.
Edie leaned in to get a closer look. "Wow, that really is spectacular. Honestly, I would have hocked it if I had it. Money's too tight these days for me to hold on to anything but family heirlooms. But a boyfriend gave it to you? Which one?"
Chelsea smiled painfully. "I just...yes. I guess so, should have hocked it." Her eyes darted around, as if searching for a getaway.
"But which boyfriend, Chelsea?" Bianca asked, restraining the laughter that bubbled within her.
"Ah..." Chelsea said. "I can't remember?"
Edie made a loud tsking noise. Kate, who had been engaged in conversation with Edie's boyfriend, Stuart, an equally chubby balding forty-something, tuned in at that moment. Kate said, "What? Chelsea's necklace?"
"John," Bianca said. "I would never be able to forget it if you bought me a necklace like Chelsea's. Did you see it?"
John looked up from his plate, his swarthy face starting to turn the shade of spring lettuce. Bianca smiled even wider. So he would be the first.
John blinked and looked over at Chelsea and then quickly away. "Yes. Very nice."
"Nice?" Bianca teased. "It's beautiful. Promise me you'll find one just like it for me. Maybe Christmas? I promise to be a good girl if I can get something like
that
in my stocking. Chel, we'll have to make sure we don't wear it at the same time when we go out, okay?"
John's eyes widened and he covered his mouth to burp carefully before replying. He cast a fleeting look at Chelsea before turning back to Bianca, a pleading look on his face. "Uh...sure. Of course, honey."
"Good," Bianca said, gloating. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Aaron give a little start, as if goosed, and put his hand on his stomach. The signs were appearing; the herd nearly ready to stampede. Bianca hunkered down in her seat and prepared to pounce.
Vodka Martini