Thor'sday Night - Paranormal Erotica (24 page)

In the end she walks away with a starfish
glowing between her breasts. ‘It’s beautiful, Jay, thank you.’

‘You’re welcome.’

‘I always used to hate Bayside, yet tonight it
seems magical.’

‘Now why do you suppose that is?’

‘Because I’m in love, sir.’

‘Or maybe you’re just well fed and very properly
fucked.’

‘No,’ she stops walking to face him, ‘it’s
because I’m in love.’ She slips her arms around his neck, oblivious
to the stream of pedestrians that has to break their flow around
them.

He pushes her away before she can kiss him, and
keeps walking.

A little hurt, she catches up with him. ‘I’m
sorry,’ she says lightly, ‘from now on I’ll refrain from public
demonstrations of affection.’

‘Good.’

Some of the magic bleeds out of the colored
lights reflected in the Bay’s black water.

He pauses beside another cart displaying rustic,
handmade jewelry, and miniature animals carved out of wood and
stone. A twining vine design catches her eye, and she moves
closer.

Hanging from a black leather cord, the amulet
appears to be made of silver, and was clearly inspired by ancient
Nordic art.

‘Maybe I can find you something to go with your
Thor’s hammer earrings,’ he says.

‘You already bought me something.’

‘I can buy you as many things as I like. Pick
out a necklace, a couple of bracelets, and some rings.’

‘Are you crazy?’ she whispers. ‘Look at the
prices.’

‘Carmen, seeing you in barbaric silver jewelry
and absolutely nothing else would be worth whatever it cost. Then
all I’d need is a few trash bags full of dirt to create a burial
mound in my bedroom you can lie across with your arms tied over
your head and your legs spread open. Poor Miriam would be vacuuming
for days.’

‘That’s not funny.’

‘I didn’t mean it… to be.’

She follows the direction of his gaze.

‘Why, Carmen,’ Linn exclaims, ‘what a pleasant
surprise.’ Having last seen her husband’s secretary with a ruggedly
handsome police officer, Linn does indeed look surprised, by
Jay.

‘Oh, hi, Linn.’ In Carmen’s personal universe,
running into her beautiful blonde rival tonight is a disaster akin
to a meteor hitting Miami. ‘Jay, this is Linn, Mike Peterson’s
wife. Linn, Jay Westgate.’

‘It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs Peterson. Your
husband is a… business acquaintance of mine.’

‘Jay works for The Department of Environmental
Resources and Monitoring,’ Carmen explains.

‘Is that so?’ Linn doesn’t seem interested.
‘Were you planning to buy her something lovely tonight, Jay?’

‘As a matter of fact, I was.’

‘Do you see anything you like, Carmen?’

‘Yes, this necklace, it looks like an ancient
Viking piece.’

‘That’s exactly right.’ She sounds surprised
that Carmen would know such a thing. ‘It’s one of my latest
pieces.’

‘We’d like to take a closer look at this one,’
Jay tells the salesgirl.

‘Certainly, sir.’

‘Everyone loves the Vikings,’ he remarks.

‘Oh, they were murderous brutes,’ Linn replies
breezily, ‘but they had a marvelously dramatic sense of style.’

‘That’s one way of putting it. Here, Carmen,
let’s see what it looks like on you.’ He slips the necklace on over
her head, and lifts her hair out of the way.

The large heavy piece falls over the starfish,
so that a fire seems to be burning behind the snake’s coiling
body.

Jay stares at it.

‘It suits her,’ Linn says quietly, ‘the silver
goes very nicely with her dark hair.’

‘Yes, it does, she looks stunning.’

‘Linn’s pieces have been doing very well,’ the
young salesgirl throws in helpfully.

Jay says firmly, ‘We’ll take it.’

‘No charge, Anna.’ Linn is feeling generous.

He pulls out his wallet. ‘How much, Anna?’

‘Um, it’s normally…’

He gives her a one hundred dollar bill. ‘Take it
out of that.’

Linn shrugs, and the girl quickly heads for the
cashbox.

‘So, where’s your husband this evening?’ Jay
asks pleasantly.

Linn’s green eyes meet Carmen’s brown ones for
an unnaturally charged second. ‘At the office. He said he had some
work to catch up on.’

‘A man with such a beautiful wife shouldn’t work
such long hours.’

Linn smiles at him. ‘What a charming thing to
say.’

‘I’m never charming, Mrs Peterson, I merely
state facts.’

‘Here you are, sir.’The salesgirl returns with
his change.

‘Thank you.’

‘He has been working odd hours lately,’ Linn
adds thoughtfully. ‘Is there something going on I should know
about, Carmen?’

She clutches the amulet around her neck. ‘What
do you mean?’ She looks down at it, pretending to admire it, but
really seeing her own twisting intestines in the coiling snake
motif.

‘You’re his personal assistant,’ Linn goes on
breezily, ‘you would know if he was busy cleaning up an oil spill,
or something nasty like that. He never discusses his work with me.
He doesn’t like to bring it home with him.’

‘You really shouldn’t answer that, Carmen,’ Jay
says, ‘you might incriminate him, and then I’d have to go after him
for harming the environment, which unfortunately can’t defend
itself. It is what it is,’ he catches her eye as she raises her
head, ‘and men often take advantage of it.’

Linn’s smile sharpens into a sickle. ‘You mean
men like my husband?’

‘He wouldn’t be the first one.’

‘Mike isn’t cleaning anything up,’ Carmen says
desperately, ‘that I know of.’

‘Well,’ Linn shrugs as if ridding herself of the
whole annoying topic, ‘it was nice seeing you again, Carmen, and a
pleasure meeting you, Jay.’ Tall and slender in a black pantsuit
(that probably cost an entire week of Carmen’s salary) she walks
away, her golden hair streaming down her back.

Jay’s apartment is dark, which makes the curved
white leather chair beside the couch glow like the crescent moon
fallen into the room through the glass doors. Carmen drifts towards
them thinking about Sage and the kittens. She left her felines
plenty of food and water, but she couldn’t leave any of the warmth
and affection they are accustomed to receiving along with their
meals. Buffy, Speckly and Runty won’t mind her absence so much, but
Sage will probably lie by the door all night waiting for her. ‘I
miss my cats,’ she thinks out loud.

‘Would you like me to take you home?’ is Jay’s
cool solution.

‘That’s not what I said.’

‘They’ll be all right.’

She unlocks the glass door, slides it open a
crack, and steps out onto the balcony.

The night is oppressively warm, without even the
ghost of a breeze. She would have liked to be greeted by a cold,
sharp wind as she stepped out beneath a glittering universe, but
only a pathetic handful of stars are visible through the thick
cloud cover and the city’s light pollution. There is another
balcony directly above her, which gives her the uncomfortable
sensation of standing just inside the mouth of a cave…

Jay steps up to the railing beside her.

‘How long have you been in Miami?’ she asks
him.

‘Since college, about fifteen years.’

‘What on earth possessed you to leave Washington
to study down here?’

‘All the hot Cuban girls.’

‘Seriously.’

‘I’m dead serious. I also wanted to get as far
away from my father as possible.’

‘And to piss him off by not attending the Ivy
League school of his choice?’

‘Exactly.’

‘I hate it down here.’

‘Why?’

‘Because there aren’t any seasons,’ she says
passionately. ‘No snow, no contrasts, no cozy fireplaces. There’s
nothing here but sand and sky. There isn’t even any real soil.’

‘Damn, that blows the Viking grave fantasy.’

She laughs.

‘If you hate it so much, why don’t you
leave?’

She says softly, exposing her soul, ‘Leaving
isn’t an option anymore.’

He doesn’t respond.

The Miami skyline glimmers like the jewelry
boxes of a vain and pleasure loving goddess.

‘Carmen?’

‘Yes?’

‘Were you fantasizing this afternoon when you
said I was the one who killed you?’

‘No, Jay, I saw it.’

‘You saw what exactly?’

‘The ritual you described. But I didn’t just see
it, I mean, it felt as real as a memory.’

‘After I conveniently described it to you,’ he
points out.

‘Look, I can hardly explain it to myself – all I
know is that it felt real. I can tell the difference between my
memories and my fantasies, and this felt like a memory, like a
memory I had tried my best to forget.’

‘Don’t worry, I think I believe you.’

‘Then why are you interrogating me?’

‘Because I’m frightened for you,’ he replies
bluntly.

‘Why?’

‘I think it’s fairly obvious why, because
history has a nasty tendency to repeat itself.’

‘It almost repeated itself already that night in
the Grove.’

‘You have no idea how tempting you are, Carmen.
Everything about you makes me want to hurt you.’

‘You can do whatever you want with me as long as
you love me,’ she answers softly.

He turns away. ‘I need another drink.’

She follows him back inside.

‘What can I get you,’ he asks, ‘besides two
other men?’

She ignores the barb. ‘I’ve had more than enough
to drink already tonight, thank you.’

‘You wouldn’t like a decaff cappuccino with
homemade whip cream?’

‘Oh, actually, I’d love one.’

He heads for the kitchen. ‘Then come help me
whip the cream, woman.’

She follows him as eagerly as Sage, and then
winces at how bright the overhead light seems after standing
outside in the dark.

‘There are certain things worth working for in
life,’ Jay comments as he opens a black side-by-side refrigerator
she immediately envies, ‘and real homemade whipped cream is one of
them.’

‘You mean you weren’t joking about whipping the
cream?’

‘I never joke about whipping, baby,’ he hands
her a carton, ‘or creaming.’ He opens a drawer, and tosses her a
wire whisk. ‘You’ll find some mixing bowls in the cabinet over the
sink.’

‘All neatly organized by Miriam?’

‘She’s a great cook.’

‘She cooks for you too?’

‘Sometimes, if she’s in the mood.’

‘What gets her in the mood?’

‘What gets every red-blooded woman in the mood
to cook – a good fuck.’

She slams a plastic bowl down on the
counter.

‘She’s married, and very much in love with her
husband, Alejandro.’

‘She’d better be! How much should I pour in
here?’

‘I thought you liked to cook.’

‘I do, but I’ve never made whipped cream before.
God, I hate you, Jay. Look at this kitchen! A real black granite
counter, a brand new gas stove, a huge refrigerator, everything a
gourmet cook could possibly desire!’

‘Consider it yours.’ He starts on the
coffee.

‘Oh, so you expect me to start cooking for you
too?’ The cream in the bowl remains a liquid despite her vigorous
efforts.

‘I’d like you to move in with me.’

She stops whipping. ‘What did you just say?’

He takes the whisk from her. ‘Let me show you
how it’s done, baby. Angle the bowl slightly, like this, relax your
wrist, and pump it, like this, as fast as you can.’

‘Would you mind repeating what you just said,
Jay.’

‘I said angle the bowl slightly…’

She grabs his wrist. ‘Before that… did you ask
me to move in with you?’

‘Yes, and I’m not going to repeat myself. It was
hard enough getting the words out the first time.’ He hands her
back the bowl and whisk and pulls two white cups and saucers from
another black cabinet.

‘But what about Sage?’

‘Can’t your mother keep her for you?’

‘But… for how long?’

‘Well, I don’t know, Carmen,’ he says patiently.
‘I have no idea how old Sage is, and how long female cats generally
live.’ The cappuccino machine begins emitting urgent choking
sounds. ‘Keep whipping,’ he commands.

Her soul feels like a tongue getting its first
taste of an indescribable sweetness.

‘Well?’ He glances back at her.

‘I’ll miss her.’

He begins pouring out the coffee while she keeps
whipping the cream, as if nothing momentous has just been
decided.

‘How about if we add a little cognac to these
for good measure?’

‘Okay,’ she says, dazed.

‘I thought you’d had enough alcohol for one
night.’

‘I changed my mind.’

‘That’s the only reason women have minds,’ he
fishes a bottle of brandy out of yet another cabinet, ‘so they can
keep changing them.’

‘Ha ha.’

‘You realize, of course,’ he pours a generous
dash of the dark gold liquid into each cup, ‘that I’m never letting
you go back to Seaside.’

She sets the bowl down on the counter. ‘But
Jay,’ she places the whisk in the sink, ‘I have—’

‘No, you don’t. You’re moving in with me, you
don’t need to work anymore for a while. You can go back to school
and get your Masters in history, or something. You have to stop
wasting the incredible mind you’re hiding behind that beautiful
face and highly fuckable body, Carmen. You’re too good to be making
coffee for bastards like Mike Peterson. Is that cream ready
yet?’

Chapter Ten

It has been years since Carmen suffered the
unsettling sensation of returning home after sunrise. Sage’s hoarse
meow! expresses hurt, confusion and relief all in one passionate
syllable.

Carmen picks her up and drapes her over one
shoulder like a baby. ‘I’m so sorry, sweetie! Mami’s so sorry!’ She
is apologizing not for staying out all night but for the fact that,
in a sense, she is going to abandon her. ‘I’ll visit you almost
everyday,’ she promises, blinking tears out of her eyes. ‘You know
I’ll always love you, sweetie, you know that!’