Outside the locker room, the four banished men were still waiting. It was obvious from the looks on their faces that they’d overheard the entire exchange. As Mike walked by, one by one, they turned away.
Mike made it a point not to look back.
Nightfall. The kid who called himself Vee sat alone in his room, pretending to be listening to some discs but not really paying attention. He had the paper on the floor. He’d bought it first thing this morning. Letters to the editor appeared on page two. He’d read one of those letters, two, three, ten times.
Dear Vee: My name is Sandra Aikens. I am the newly appointed chief of police of Alexandria County and I am writing to you on behalf of our citizens. I am writing to tell you that you are not alone. I am writing to tell you that we all care. I am writing to tell you that your letters touched me personally, and I would like to do whatever I can to help you. This need not end in violence.
Vee hadn’t expected a reply. He didn’t know what he thought about this. A couple of kids at school had laughed over the letter.
Looky here, Vee’s got a pen pal. The new chief of police has gone sweet on him. Ah, ain’t that cute?
Vee hadn’t said a word. Just listened. Everyone around school was talking about this kid named Vee as if they knew him. Vee be an O.G.B., they liked to say. Serious rep. A man of stature. Of course he hang in my hood.
Nobody knew a thing. Vee was a made-up. Didn’t have no more substance than Zorro or Robin Hood or some freak like that. Vee’d invented the name to go with the letter. He’d also invented the rep. The kid who called him self Vee wasn’t really no straight shooter. He wasn’t in a gang; he didn’t hang in no hood. In the words of the street, he was nobody. A thirteen-year-old nobody. Sometimes, that fact hurt the worst.
’Course that might all be changed now. Mac-Two had seen him go into the building this afternoon. He’d spotted Vee’s gun and seemed to know what was going down. Would he talk? Tell others? Did it matter?
Vee didn’t know anymore.
Today he’d had his finger on the trigger. He’d seen their car in the park when he be walking home from school. He’d gone straight into the building, watching the curly-haired woman across the street. The sun had hit her hair and set it on fire. Pretty chief of police. He hadn’t known that. It made him feel funny.
Then she be picking up the baby. Kid streaking dirt all over the woman’s fancy suit while she smiled and coochy-cooed. It had bothered Vee. The mother should take her kid back. Show some respect. A pretty, classy lady like that didn’t need to be covered in no east-side dirt.
But the chief lady had been happy playing with the baby. She’d held it close.
Finally, long time later it seemed, she handed it back. Vee watched Mac-Two glance at him in the building. Vee watched the other kids bolt. All alone now. Clean line of sight. All he had to do was pull the trigger. Take out the lady cop and big detective. Just do it.
He be staring at the mud streaks on the pretty jacket. His finger slide off the trigger like it got a mind of its own. He be a loser after all, not an O.G.B. like his brother. He be nobody.
Dear Vee…I am writing to tell you that your letters touched me personally, and I would like to do whatever I can to help you. This need not end in violence.
Ah lady, it all end in violence, he thought. You too rich, too white to know a thing. You stopped in the middle of the street, when any experienced dude knows to jump for cover.
Vee kicked away the paper. He reached under his bed, where a big old cardboard box held dozens and dozens of firearms. He got a 9 mm, he got a .38 special, he got shotguns. No matter how many guns he threw at cops, he always came home to more. This was his brother’s legacy, the arsenal that was supposed to keep Big S Sammy safe.
At the funeral, Vee had tucked two 9 mms in his brother’s coffin. Just in case heaven didn’t turn out no better than the east side, and Big S Sammy still had some more killing to do.
Vee went to the kitchen. Fixed himself some mac and cheese. Cupboards didn’t hold much else. In a day or two, they’d be empty.
Vee went into the living room. His sister rocked in front of the TV, her face turned away so she’d be pretty. When he walked into the room, she turned toward him, and the big shiny scar looked like a hot penny seared into her cheek.
“What you staring at?” she screeched.
“Nothin,” Vee mumbled, and ducked his head. He shuffled back into his bedroom, where he could once more be a straight shooter named Vee, and not just some little kid annoying the snot out of his big sister.
He sat on the bed with dinner. He stared at his pile of guns. Then he read the letter to the editor, two, three, ten more times.
This need not end in violence.
Lady, lady, you don’t know a thing.
Chapter 9
W
aiting for Mike to arrive, Sandra was nervous. At six, she took a long bubble bath, scented by a healthy dollop of her favorite perfume. She told herself she was older and wiser, she knew what she was doing now. She and Mike had had their differences. Of course, a few good conversations didn’t magically change everything, but it was a start. Plus, you couldn’t deny their chemistry. Heavens, you couldn’t forget their chemistry.
She followed her bubble bath with a heavy dose of rich lotion, smoothing it onto her legs, her arms, her face. She rubbed her skin until it glowed and then she thought of Mike’s rough palms moving over her skin as well. The way he used to caress her body, so slow, so patient. Whispering sweet words in French…
Her insides went hot and liquid. She thought less of the fights they used to have—the endless succession of fights—and more about how well they made up. On the floor, the sofa, the kitchen counter, the bed.
At seven o’clock, she was sorting through her scant selection of lingerie. She used to have more, but as any good divorcée, she’d tossed an armful of delicates the day after signing the papers. Her marriage had failed. Surely that meant her underwear had not gotten the job done.
She had a weakness for soft, lacy items, however, that extended long after Mike’s departure. She liked the feel of fine fabric against her skin. She liked wearing stern power suits with mannish shoulders, knowing that underneath she was pure lace. It gave her a secret to carry around with her all day.
You think you know who I am just by looking? Honey, you don’t know a thing….
Mike knew what was beneath her suits, of course. And if memory served, his favorite color was peach.
She owned one teddy in that shade. Very thin fabric, not a lot of material. She slipped that on. She dabbed perfume everywhere she could think of, then dabbed it a few new places just to be sure. She saw that her hands were shaking now. Mike would be here in just a half an hour. And then…
What was she doing? So there was chemistry. There had always been chemistry. From day one they had torn off each other’s clothes. But what about after that? Remember all the nights of him coming home and barely saying a word? Or the long Saturday afternoons at his parents’ house, his mom looking at Sandra as if she wished she’d burst into flame. His brothers and sisters, laughing and joking and leaving Sandra alone on the fringes.
Better, the Sunday afternoons at her parents’ house, when her mother would look at Mike as if she wished he’d drop dead. Then those endless dinner parties with everyone chattering about money, money, money while Mike fell asleep over the entrée from pure boredom.
What about the times when Sandra was anxious about her job, trying to talk about her day, and Mike just looked at her and said, “Relax,
ma chère,
” as if that should make all her worries go away? What about the times she would find him staring off into space, looking troubled, and yet when she asked him about it later, he simply said, “I’m fine,
ma chère.
Just fine.”
What about all those moments? The doubt, the hurt, the mistrust? The millions of tiny ways they failed each other every day without ever knowing they were doing so? Funny, she’d been so sure marriages ended over big, cataclysmic issues. She had never suspected they could also erode like a rock, constantly battered by small, swirling waves.
Then, Sandra realized she didn’t care. She was thirty-four years old. She was standing in the middle of her bedroom in nothing but a peach teddy, and she wanted her ex-husband. She wanted his arms around her again. She wanted to listen to his Cajun drawl, watch the way his dark eyes crinkled at the corners when he grinned. She missed the way he held her, the way he could always coax her into a smile. She missed the warmth and spontaneity he brought to her life, the times she would look at him and see the father of her children, plain as day. She had tried other men, richer, better dressed, more successful choices—her parents’ kind of people. They all left her feeling empty.
No, the only man who had ever held her attention—for better or worse—was Mike.
Seven forty-five. Sandra blew her kinky hair into soft ringlets framing her face. A light dusting of blush here, mascara there. Pink lip gloss for her mouth, drop pearls for her ears. Perfect. She promptly threw on jeans and Mike’s dress shirt to cover everything up. Just in case.
The doorbell rang. Sandra checked her hair one last time, played nervously with two curls, then headed down the hall.
She had no sooner opened the door than Mike swept into the room. His eyes were dark and burning. She’d seen that look before. He shrugged out of his sports coat.
“Like your shirt,” he said. Then he pulled her into his arms.
The first kiss was hot. Blazing. She could feel his intensity, his need. He angled her head expertly, and brought her against him hard. She shivered. He was in a mood. The logical part of her mind recognized that. The rest of her was too flattered to care.
He pushed her into the living room. No need for small talk now. They backed up against the sofa, wrestling with the buttons on each other’s shirts. Mike’s fingers were faster. The minute he discovered the teddy, he sucked in his breath.
“You like it?” she asked hesitantly.
“Mon Dieu,”
he breathed. “Peach.”
“I remembered…”
“Ah,
ma chère…
”
This kiss was softer. Slow. For a moment, Sandra swore she saw tears in her ex-husband’s eyes. Then his lips were upon her throat, nibbling a line up to her ear. He drew in her earlobe, and settled her more intimately against his body.
She finally managed to get his shirt unbuttoned. She pushed it off his shoulders at the same time he dropped her white shirt to the floor. She pulled him back into her arms immediately, gasping at the first electric touch of exposed skin to exposed skin. She always loved that moment when she had him naked against her. She always marveled at how hot his skin could feel. She liked pressing her breasts against the hard plane of his chest. She liked to run her hands over his collarbone, down the rippling curves of his arms. He was strong and powerfully built. No matter how many times she saw him naked, it always turned her on.
“Stop it.” He finally caught her hands with his own. His breath was coming out rough, his words a mere growl. He took her hand and placed it against the front of his pants so there could be no mistake.
Yes, he was hard. He felt positively delicious.
“Take off your clothes, Sandra,” he whispered thickly. “I want to see you wearing nothing but that teddy. Then I want to kiss every inch of your skin.”
She yanked off her pants hastily, impatiently kicking them aside. He stripped off his own, as well, standing before her in nothing but a lopsided grin and a pair of cotton boxers decorated with Winnie-the-Pooh. The sight made her giggle. Then it made her want him more.
“I like your underwear better,” he said.
“Okay. Take it off.”
He took his sweet time, his hands devilishly slow and controlled as they danced across her shoulders. How could she have forgotten the delicate whisper of his fingertips against her skin? The rasping feel of strong fingers sliding down her neck, hovering just above the swell of her breasts. And then his lips, kissing her teasingly, coaxing her head up, her body into his, while his fingers still lingered, brushing her skin but not moving one inch lower when she desperately wanted them to.
Then, just when she thought she might scream from frustration, his fingers flickered over her silk-covered breasts. His thumbs massaged her nipples. His palms cupped her breasts. Her own hands finally slipped the thin straps of the teddy off her shoulders. The top fell down, exposing herself completely to his hands.
He ducked his head and took one nub into his mouth.
She whimpered. She buried her hands in his dark, thick hair. She held his head against her and thought if he ended it now she’d die. No, she would kill him first. Then she’d die.
“Please,” she murmured. “Please.”
He moved to her other breast, laving it with equal care. Then he drew the nub between his lips and suckled hard. She released her pent-up breath as nearly a scream and found the waistband of his boxers. She jerked them down savagely. She pressed herself against his hard length, rubbing her silk-clad belly against him.
He responded by tossing her over the back of the sofa and following her down into the pillows. Now they had her teddy off. Now they were naked body pressed to naked body, sweat-slick skin against sweat-slick skin.
His hands seemed to be all over her. Then they found her hot, wet folds, slipping into her body, moving with exquisite care. She grabbed his arms so tightly her fingers welted his skin. It had been too long for her. She could feel the pressure building up to unbelievable levels and she thought when the climax finally came, it would tear her apart. She didn’t want to be shattered alone.
“Now,” she murmured. “Now!”
He settled between her legs. She had one last glimpse of his face. His eyes were so dark they were bottomless. Sweat beaded his brow. Tension set his jaw. He looked handsome and a heartbeat later, as he plunged into her body, she thought he looked sad, torn in two.