Authors: Janet Goss
Perfect on Paper
FANCY MEETING YOU HERE
M
y cell phone rang just as I was getting into bed, but, according to plan, I let the call go straight to voice mail. I fluffed my pillows, switched off the light, and closed my eyes.
But only until enough time had elapsed for me to retrieve the message.
“I know you’re up there,” Billy said. “And if you don’t come down and talk to me in the next two minutes, I’m going to give you my best Stanley Kowalski impression until you do.”
He wouldn’t. He
couldn’t
. He—
“Daaanaaaaa!”
Oh crap.
“Daaaaaanaaaaaa!”
I jumped into a pair of jeans and raced down the stairs to discover Billy leaning against the mailboxes in the outside foyer. Grinning, he mouthed the words,
What took you so long?
I unlocked the front door and opened it just wide enough for us to converse without having to shout through the glass. But he was too fast for me. Instantly my back was against the door of my super’s apartment, and Billy was kissing me and kissing me and kissing me.…
Until the super’s mangy little mongrel started yapping frantically and hurling its body against the other side of the door. We froze, eyes locked.
“You are
not
invited upstairs,” I said.
“Then come outside and sit with me on the stoop for a while. Tell me about this harrowing evening of yours.”
The last thing in the world I wanted to do was discuss my harrowing evening. “Honestly, it’s not important. Besides, it’s twenty degrees out there.” I’d run downstairs too quickly to grab a jacket.
He opened his and cocooned me inside it, and my brain turned to pudding while I let him guide me out the door. We settled on the top step with me sitting between his legs, both of us snug in his coat. “See? Nice and warm.”
Warm, my ass. It was hot as hell out there.
PERFECT
ON PAPER
JANET GOSS
NEW AMERICAN LIBRARY
NEW AMERICAN LIBRARY
Published by New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto,
Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2,
Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)
Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell,
Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)
Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre,
Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017, India
Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632,
New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)
Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue,
Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
First published by New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Printing, March 2012
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Copyright © Janet Siefert, 2012
All rights reserved
REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
:
Goss, Janet, 1957–
Perfect on paper/Janet Goss.
p. cm.
ISBN: 978-1-101-57704-2
I. Title.
PS3607.O853P47 2012
813’.6—dc23 2011044645
Set in Adobe Garamond
Designed by Elke Sigal
Printed in the United States of America
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
For Edgar, my long-suffering husband
PERFECT ON PAPER
Chapter One: Tongue And Groove
Chapter Four: You Can’t Make This Stuff Up
Chapter Five: Speak of the Devil
Chapter Six: A Day of Reckoning
Chapter Eight: An Inconvenient Truth
Chapter Nine: The Cat in the Hat Comes Back
Chapter Eleven: There Goes the Neighborhood
Chapter Twelve: Two Across, Six Down
Chapter Thirteen: Mister Excitement
Chapter Fourteen: A Hot Dog Makes Me Lose Control
Chapter Fifteen: Make Mine a Double
Chapter Seventeen: Cush and Boots
Chapter Eighteen: Cleanup on Aisle Three
Chapter Nineteen: Double Jeopardy
Chapter Twenty: Make Room for Daddy
Chapter Twenty-One: I Guess I’m Losing My Mind
Chapter Twenty-Two: The Salvation Army
Chapter Twenty-Three: Nude Ascending a Staircase
Chapter Twenty-Four: In the Belly of the Beast
Chapter Twenty-Five: Judas Priest
Chapter Twenty-Six: Truth and Consequences
Chapter Twenty-Seven: A Sight for Sore Eyes
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Nature Calls
Chapter Twenty-Nine: Flying Blind
TONGUE AND GROOVEU
nder ordinary circumstances, I could ring a doorbell as well as anyone. Nothing to it—one push, mission accomplished.
But not that Sunday afternoon on Perry Terrace. My hands had begun to tremble when I’d boarded the downtown R train at Astor Place, and they were fluttering like hummingbirds by the time I arrived at Bay Ridge Avenue a seemingly endless nineteen stops and forty minutes later. I poked at the bell multiple times, jabbing and missing, jabbing and missing, like a cyclops devoid of depth perception.
Not to mention common sense. I was taking a risk just by being there. But there was where I was, standing on the threshold of the “3BR, 2B, spac liv rm w/ det gar!” on Perry Terrace, about to take the grand tour.
If I could just manage to make contact with the damn doorbell and gain access.
Not that I had any intention of relocating to Brooklyn, any more than I was attending Bay Realty’s Sunday afternoon open house in order to check out the property on Perry Terrace. I was there to check out the real estate agent, Renée Devine—who happened to be the daughter of the former love of my life.
