Totlandia: Spring (8 page)

“As I said before, that option is not on the table. More to the point, are you willing to take what I have to offer? Runts aren’t show dogs, but they make great pets. You did say it was for your daughter, didn’t you?”

“Yes, of course it’s for Lily! But it’s also for me! I mean, it will be our
family’
s dog.”

“Good! Then we have an agreement.” Sybil glared down at Bettina.

Bettina shrugged. Perhaps she was being silly. Who was to know if the dog were the pick or the runt? Besides, if she gave it enough vitamins, with its superior blood line, she had no doubt it could be another Caligula in no time.

“Okay then, I’ll take the…
runt
.” The word seemed to stick in her throat. “How much?”

Sybil snatched the check from her hand. “This will do.”

Bettina grabbed it back again. “But ten thousand was for the pick!”

Sybil glared at her. “I never said that. You did. In fact, you said any dog with Zenobia’s bloodline is ‘priceless.’ No arguments there. Take it or leave it. I have others who’ll gladly pay the price.”

Bettina glanced over at Zenobia. The dog had flopped down on her side beside her feed dish. Her wheezing was so loud that Lily had covered her ears with her hands.

Bettina couldn’t blame her. The dog looked as if it would expire at any moment. And yet, she couldn’t shake the memory of that massive stud Caligula. So grand! So noble! So obedient!

Slowly she let go of the check.

Sybil examined it before sticking it in her pocket. “Zenobia is due any day now. That said, her pups should be weaned by Valentine’s Day.”

“Here’s hoping it’s a happy birth day,” Bettina muttered. “Come, Lily.”

The little girl didn’t have to be asked twice. She was out the door in a flash.

4:55 p.m.

Usually at midday, tiny, gated Allyne Park, at the corner of Gough and Green, was filled with idlers playing hide-and-seek with any of the sun’s rays that had found its way through the park’s tallest redwoods. But at five o’clock on a blustery January evening, the sun had already dipped behind the grand old apartment building on the park’s west side, leaving it empty except for a young collie and its owner, a father teaching his three-year-old son how to kick a soccer ball. The man’s wife, large with child beneath her cashmere coat, sat on a nearby bench. She was reading the latest edition of the
Nob Hill Gazette
.

But no, they weren’t alone. Brady was already there, sitting on one of the benches tucked behind a copse of redwoods. When he saw Ally, he stood up. That’s when she noticed he was holding two dozen long-stemmed roses: pale yellow, with tips that looked as if they’d been dipped in a warm pink paint.

She hesitated before opening the old wrought iron gate that separated her from the man she wished was free to love her.

Finally, she slid the gate’s lock to one side. Each step she took toward him made it harder for her to stick to her decision to let him go.

“The florist called them ‘Chicago Peace.’” He shrugged. “I just thought they were pretty.”

She nodded. “They are. But really, Brady, you shouldn’t have.”

Realizing she wasn’t going to take them, he dropped his arm to his side. The stems were so long the petals almost touched the grass.

The collie came by and sniffed them, then crouched down, wagging his tail. When he realized Brady wasn’t about to play with him, he leaped and pranced, then got back down on his haunches with a whine.

Brady laughed. “You see? He appreciates them. Why can’t you?”

Ally shrugged. “I’m not the one you should be buying them for.”

On the drive from Foot Fetish to the park, she had worked out everything she was going to say to him. Like how dropping Jade for her would ruin things for both Oliver and Zoe. And how Jade would be heartbroken.

Even if that didn’t mean anything to Brady, it certainly mattered to Ally.

She was just about to launch into her argument for why they should keep it simple and just stay friends when she noticed something on his cheek: an eyelash.

She reached up very gently with her index and middle finger and whisked it away.

He took her fingers and placed them on his lips.

Slowly she pulled her fingers away. This left his lips hovering over hers.

She couldn’t help herself. She kissed him.

No really, she devoured him.

When she felt his arms around her, she heard the collie barking like crazy, and she knew he had tossed the roses on the ground.

She also knew she wasn’t going to be keeping her promise to herself, or to Jade.

She broke away, gasping for air. “I hate myself.” She buried her head in her hands.

He tilted her head so that they were eye to eye again. “Why would you say that? Why do you feel that way?”

“Because…because I never wanted to be ‘the other woman.’”

Brady shook his head in disbelief. “How can you be ‘the other woman’ if there is no first ‘woman?’”

“Lower your voice, please.” Ally nodded toward the family.

There was no way the mother could have overheard her. Still, almost as if she had read Ally’s mind, the woman slowly heaved herself off the bench and beckoned her husband to follow her out the gate. She whistled for the collie, too, but he leaped away before she could tether his collar to the leash in her hand. Seeing that the gate was already open, the dog scurried out. The woman chased behind him.

Realizing her dilemma, the woman’s husband grabbed the soccer ball in one hand while he hoisted their son up onto his shoulders with the other, and headed out the gate after his wife.

One and a half kids and a dog,
thought Ally. The typical American family. They love each other. They’re building a life together. No clinging exes, no gay fake husbands. No need for a sperm donor in order to beat your biological clock…

No jumping through hoops to get into some silly club.

You choose what you lose in life,
Ally conceded.
Brady will have to wait.

“Brady, as much as you like to pretend otherwise, Jade is still in love with you. Yes, of course she wants to be a part of Oliver’s life. But she also wants to be a part of yours.”

He shook his head adamantly. “It’s not going to happen. I’ve made that clear to her.”

“Have you, really?” Ally cocked her head to one side. “Be honest. Since she’s moved in, have the two of you…I’m asking you if you…Have you made love to her?”

His silence spoke volumes.

Finally, he turned his head toward the street. “Yes, you’re right. I screwed up! And I wish things were different. But for the time being, they are what they are.”

“That’s why we can’t move things forward. Not now, anyway.” She dropped her head until she was staring at their entwined fingers. She marveled at his. They were long, lean, and tan. She imagined them roaming all over her body, tempting her with his touch, opening her to his love…

The thought made her blush.

And it made her want him even more.

She opened her mouth to tell him so, to admit she couldn’t live without him and that she was even willing to leave PHM&T if need be, when they heard the screech of tires and a bone-chilling scream.

Someone was shouting for an ambulance.

Instinctively both Brady and Ally’s eyes went to the street corner. The family had left the gate open, and the collie, frantic, ran back into the park, barking and growling before it leaped back out again.

By the time Ally and Brady reached the street, a crowd had gathered. One man was routing cars around the father, who lay in the street, screaming in pain. His legs and arms were askew like a broken doll. The leash was in his hand. The driver of the car that must have hit him was leaning over him, chanting his apology like a desperate mantra, over and over again.

The stricken man’s wife struggled to hold her wailing son in her arms before the boy ran into the street to comfort his father. She shifted her gaze toward the park. Seeing Ally, she screamed, “Look at what you’ve done! Look at what you’ve done!”

Is she right?
Ally wondered.
Did I leave the gate open when I entered the park? No, I couldn’t have…

Oh my God! What have I done?

But no, the woman wasn’t screaming at Ally. She was shouting at the collie.

The dog whined mournfully before trotting off down the street, morose and lost.

Ashamed, Ally turned around. Her instinct was to go back into the park. But why? It wasn’t as if she could turn back the clock.

There was nothing waiting for her there.

As she sobbed, Brady cradled her head to his chest.

She stayed there in his arms until the ambulance came and left with the injured man and his family. Slowly, the crowd dissolved, and cars once again glided right over the spot where the man had lain.

“I should drive you home,” Brady murmured in her ear.

“No!” She shook her head. “No. You should leave.”

As if reading her mind, he said, “It’s not your fault, Ally. I know for a fact you closed the gate. And even if you had left it open, the accident could have been caused by any number of variables. The driver of the car should’ve been more alert. Or maybe he shouldn’t have been going so fast. At the very least, the damn dog should have been on a leash!”

“I don’t want the guilt, Brady! It hurts too much!”

“You’re overreacting. You’re projecting your feelings about…about us onto this freak accident.”

Before he could say another word, she put her fingers on his lips. She remembered doing that before. It seemed like a million years ago.

“Let’s go home and hold our babies,” she whispered. “I’ll call you, soon.”

She allowed him to walk her to her car.

They both knew the decision she had already made.

Still, she knew he’d wait for her call.

Thursday, 10 January

1:48 p.m.

“Who was that on the phone?” asked Lorna.

She’d been pacing impatiently by the front door for the past twenty minutes in anticipation of her mother’s arrival. “Was it Hera? She rarely comes into the city. And when she does, she gets lost at the drop of a hat. If need be, I can meet her down at the corner of Van Ness and Vallejo, to show her how to get up here—”

“Whoa! Calm down and take a deep breath.” Matthew’s soft, soothing tone was the same one he used when he played with Dante. “It was only Bettina. She wanted you to meet her at Mother’s today to go over the details of the Easter egg hunt. I told her you had to hang here.”

“Oh my God! You didn’t tell her why, did you?” The thought of Bettina barging in on them in order to meet Hera, only to diss her to anyone within hearing distance—particularly Eleanor—was too much for Lorna to bear.

He laughed. “Hey, I’m no fool. I told her Dante had a play date. I figure she wouldn’t show her face here if she thought a battalion of one-year-olds were underfoot.”

The tension went out of Lorna’s shoulders. “That was smart thinking on your part. And it is a ‘play date’ of sorts.”

The crunch of car wheels on the driveway brought the trepidation back to her face. She ran to the window. Yes, it was her mother. She had come in a brand new Leaf. That was to be expected.

But Hera wasn’t alone. A pale bald man with a hawk nose, wearing almost sheer, white flowing robes, got out of the car, too.

“Battle stations,” Lorna murmured under her breath as Matthew opened the front door.

“Your aura is nice, Matthew.” Hera tilted her head as she examined her son-in-law. “A bright pink. The telltale sign of a tender and passionate soul. What a wonderful counterbalance to Lorna’s! She’s been a cloudy blue for so many years now.”

At a loss for how to answer, Matthew gave a thumbs-up to his mother-in-law.

Lorna stifled a groan. She was a cloudy blue, eh? She’d been around Hera’s mumbo jumbo all her life. She knew that in ReikiSpeak Hera had just pegged her as being fearful of the future and indecisive.

Scared.

She may have been right once, but not now,
Lorna thought. The cost of fear is too high. It’s Dante’s well-being.

Lorna glowered at her mother. “I thought I made it clear that you were to come alone.”

Hera’s smile faltered, but only for a moment. “You specifically said I couldn’t bring the shaman, so I didn’t.” She raised a thin arm in the direction of her companion. “You know very well that a swami is someone very different.” Before Lorna could contradict her, Hera held out her arms to Matt. “Ah, and our little man here. May I hold him? So pale and yellow is his glow! Swami B, you see it too, don’t you?”

The man in the flowing robes bobbed his head. “Yes, Hera, this child is an old soul! A healer in his own right.”

“One day, maybe.” Hera clapped her hands together. “Wouldn’t that be wonderful?”

“Mother, I told you about Dante’s condition. He’ll have his own issues to work through.”

“Yes, dear Lorna. That is what Swami B and I are here for.” She nodded at the man.

“Swami B?” Matt asked. “The B stands for…what? Bailey? Brown? Berkowitz?”

The swami shrugged. “Brownstein.”

Matt squinted at him. “I thought you looked familiar! Aren’t you the guy on that infomercial about those tricked-out timeshares?”

“Good eye! Used to be. Then the Great Recession brought me enlightenment.”

Hera snapped her fingers in front of his face. “Enough already. I paid you to do a healing, remember? It’s time to commence.”

Swami B put his hands on Dante’s head and muttered a fast and furious chant, but the little boy obviously didn’t like it because he moaned and squirmed.

Lorna slapped the man’s hands away. “Stop it! You’re scaring him!”

“Lorna! How dare you?” Hera’s voice trembled. “We came all this way, and this is how you treat us?”

“I asked you here because I thought you cared about me and wanted to be involved in my life.” Lorna’s tears felt like hot coals on her cheeks. “All I’m asking is that you be sensitive to my son’s needs and respect our wishes for him. Mother—
Hera
—really! Is that too much to ask?”