Authors: Candy Halliday
Unfreakingbelieveable!
Zada hurried into the adjoining bath.
Nothing but calamity awaited her there.
She walked back into the bedroom, shaking her head.
“I just can’t believe Rick would do this,” Zada said.
“Neither can I,” Tish said. “I guess this proves how serious Rick is about keeping Simon and the house.”
Zada’s eyes narrowed.
Jen sent Tish a mean look. “You just had to say that, didn’t you? Don’t you realize you’re only making Zada more determined
to continue this nonsense?” “I’ll
show
him serious,” Zada vowed.
“So?” Tish said, ignoring Jen’s scathing look. “Like I said before. What now?”
Alicia glanced over at Rick as they walked along the trail. Her better judgment told her not to confess to Rick that she really
wasn’t interested in him. But Rick was in a vulnerable position at the moment; she also didn’t want to lead him on.
She decided to test the waters a bit. See if Rick would be interested in a collaboration. Making Zada jealous could benefit
both of them.
Alicia said, “You seem nervous, Rick. Are you uncomfortable with me taking a walk with you?”
He looked back over his shoulder for a second.
“A little,” he admitted when he turned back around.
“Can I ask why?”
He sighed and said, “I made a stupid comment after Zada slammed the door in your face yesterday. I was only trying to get
back at her for something she’d said to me.”
He stopped walking and faced her. “Look, Alicia,” he said, “I don’t know any other way to say this. I’m not interested in
you personally.”
Alicia laughed. “That’s the same thing I was getting ready to tell you.”
He looked puzzled.
Alicia said, “I didn’t know you and Zada weren’t divorced when I came over yesterday morning, Rick. And the only reason I
came over was because I’m tired of being treated like a leper by the women in this neighborhood.”
He still looked puzzled.
Alicia said, “I was hoping if you and I went out occasionally, maybe everyone would stop seeing me as the threatening divorcée
waiting to pounce on their husbands.”
Rick laughed. “I see,” he said.
They started walking again.
“And then Zada rushed over and asked me to back off where you were concerned.”
His head jerked in her direction. “Really?”
“I told Zada I’d do her a favor, if she’d do one for me and invite me to join the Housewives’ Fantasy Club. The minute it
spreads through the neighborhood that Jen, Tish, and Zada have accepted me, I’ll be taken off the Woodberry Park blackball
list.”
Rick said, “But I heard Zada refused to invite you to their meeting.”
Alicia said, “Exactly. And that’s why I’m strolling down the walking path with you right now.”
Rick stopped walking.
The expression on his face said he knew exactly where the conversation was heading.
“Look, Alicia,” he said. “I might have teased Zada about you yesterday, but I’m not interested in purposely making her jealous
in any way, shape, or form. I wouldn’t do that to her. First, because that’s not who I am. Second, Zada had a womanizer for
a father, and I don’t think she’s ever gotten over it.”
Alicia wasn’t ready to give up yet.
“Not even if it means you keeping Simon and the house?”
“No,” Rick said. “I know Zada and I are playing games with each other right now, but that’s one game I’m not interested in
playing.”
Alicia gave in and said, “You’re a good guy, Rick. Zada obviously doesn’t know you very well or she wouldn’t have asked me
to back off.”
“That’s been our problem all along,” Rick said. “We should have waited until we knew each other better before we got married.”
“I can certainly identify with that statement,” Alicia said, but she had no intention of elaborating any further.
Nor did she have any intention of telling Rick, that regardless of his refusal to play her let’s-make-Zada-jealous game, she
wasn’t
ready to back off yet. She’d accomplished exactly what she’d wanted to accomplish when she saw Rick leave the house and head
for the walking trail: She’d let him know exactly where she stood.
She was also willing to bet Rick would never repeat one word of their conversation. Not to Zada. Or anyone else. Rick was
just that kind of guy. Straight up and honest.
“Well,” Alicia said, confident that her mission was over. “Since I can’t persuade you to help me further my cause with an
invitation to the Housewives’ Fantasy Club, I can at least let you enjoy the rest of your walk in peace.”
Rick laughed. “I didn’t say you couldn’t walk with us, Alicia. I just said I wasn’t interested in making Zada jealous.”
Simon growled in disagreement.
Alicia jumped back.
“Simon!” Rick scolded, jerking on his leash.
Alicia said, “There’s no need to keep scolding poor Simon. Dogs and kids never like me. I think they can sense I’m uncomfortable
around them.”
“Seriously?” Rick asked.
Alicia nodded. “I was bitten by a dog as a child. And I’ve never really been around kids.”
“I’m an only child, too,” Rick said.
“Oh, I’m not an only child,” Alicia said. “I have a twin brother. We just have a hypochondriac for a mother. My mother’s germ
phobia kept us away from other kids. And her allergies prevented us from ever having pets.”
Rick said, “You never thought about getting a pet as an adult?”
Alicia laughed and shook her head. “A goldfish, maybe,” she told him. “But that would be the only acceptable pet on my list.”
Rick’s cell phone rang.
Alicia saw her chance.
She waved good-bye and hurried off.
But she couldn’t keep from smiling as she walked away. She’d seen Zada watching from the window. Felt those dark-brown daggers
aimed at her back.
Too damn bad.
Zada could have completely avoided any angst from her.
All she’d asked Zada for was a simple invitation!
Rick placed his cell phone to his ear when Alicia walked away. Joe didn’t waste any time filling him in on the scoop.
“I thought you’d like to know I just watched my wife and Jen go through your front door a few minutes ago.”
“Perfect,” Rick said. “At least someone’s there to call 911. Zada’s probably passed out on the floor.”
Joe said, “You really went through with it?”
“Yup,” Rick said proudly. “The kitchen. The guest bedroom where I’m sleeping. Even the guest bathroom.”
“I have to tell you, Rick,” Joe said. “I truly didn’t think you had it in you, buddy.”
That makes two of us.
But Rick said, “Maybe you don’t know me as well as you think you do, Joe.”
“I’m sure that’s what Zada’s thinking about now,” Joe said and laughed.
“Guaranteed,” Rick said.
“What do you think Zada’s next move will be?”
Rick said, “We could both avoid going into the living room, but we can’t avoid using the kitchen. She might hold out for the
rest of today, but Zada will fold by tomorrow and clean up my mess. Then maybe we can sit down like two rational adults, and
I can remind her that I’ll gladly buy her a place of her own anywhere she wants.”
“And you really think she’ll accept your offer?”
“No,” Rick said. “But I can always hope.”
“Hey, the girls are coming back out,” Joe said. “Gotta run.”
Rick closed his cell phone. He dropped it back into his shorts’ pocket. And looked down at Simon.
“I think we’d better extend our walk longer than usual this morning for safety’s sake, boy,” Rick told the dog. “After the
mess I’ve made and Alicia showing up, we need to give our master plenty of time to calm down before we go back home.”
Zada stood watching at the kitchen door.
When she saw Rick and Simon start through the backyard, she jumped back from the door and hurried across the kitchen to the
table. When Rick and Simon walked into the kitchen, she was sitting calmly on one of the now cushionless kitchen chairs, thumbing
through her latest issue of Oprah’s
O
magazine.
From the corner of her eye, she saw Rick bend down and unfasten Simon’s leash from his collar. Simon immediately trotted over
and placed his big head on the magazine she was holding in her lap.
“Did you have a good walk?” Zada asked sweetly, rubbing Simon’s head.
“We had a great walk,” Rick said.
I just bet you did!
Zada fumed.
But she said, “I was talking to Simon.”
“In case you haven’t noticed,” Rick said, “Simon can’t talk. I was answering for him.”
“Simon talks to
me
all the time,” Zada said in baby talk. “Don’t you, my sweet buddy?” She gently stroked the big dog’s ears, still never once
looking at Rick. And if he thought for one second she would give him the satisfaction of even uttering Alicia’s name, he was
as crazy as she’d been for egging Alicia on in the first place.
Two seconds.
Five seconds.
Ten seconds.
“Well?” Rick said, just as she knew he would.
Zada finally looked at him. “Well, what?”
“Cut the crap, Zada. Don’t you have anything to say?”
“About what?”
Rick’s ears turned deep red.
Zada almost laughed out loud.
“About your challenge today,” Rick said. “As if you didn’t know exactly what I meant.”
Zada blinked innocently. “What about it?”
Rick said, “Don’t lie and say you weren’t shocked that I beat you to the punch and trashed the kitchen before you and your
domestic diva buddies could trash it yourselves.”
“Do I appear to be shocked?”
“Yes,” Rick said. “You appear to be so flipping shocked you can’t even carry on a simple conversation.”
Zada’s face turned red this time.
Rick did laugh out loud.
“And in case you haven’t gone upstairs yet,” Rick said, “I also beat you to my bedroom and my bathroom.”
Zada tossed her hair nonchalantly.
“Then that was your mistake,” she told him. “We agreed the bedrooms were off limits.”
The look on his face was priceless.
“When did we agree to that?” he boomed.
It was a lie, of course.
But Zada was counting on Rick not remembering the conversation they had in the courthouse hallway word for word. He had, after
all, been standing there like a zombie.
“We agreed the bedrooms were off limits while we were arguing over the king-size bed,” Zada said with a straight face. “I
said flipping a coin for the master bedroom wasn’t a topic for discussion.
My
bed, I said.
My
bedroom. And that bedrooms were off limits. You agreed, and said, quite
smugly
if I remember correctly, ‘For now.’”
The truth she’d sprinkled in with the lie worked.
“Damn,” Rick mumbled under his breath.
“What did you say?” Zada couldn’t resist asking.
“Nothing,” Rick grumbled. “I didn’t say a thing.”
He walked out of the kitchen shaking his head.
Zada stuffed a hand in her mouth to keep from laughing.
“Gee, was it something I said then?” she called out as he headed down the hallway.
Simon’s ears pricked. He whimpered, then trotted after Rick.
Turncoat,
Zada thought. Until she heard the doorbell.
“Don’t worry,” Rick yelled out. “My legs still aren’t broken. I’ll get the door.”
That better not be Alicia!
Zada vowed.
Until she heard the last voice she was expecting.
“You obviously won the house in the divorce, Rick. But what have you done with Zada?”
Zada jumped up from the chair.
Mom!
No! No! No!
Yes, her mother had left a dozen messages on her voice mail since Friday. And yes, she did intend to call her mother back.
After
she figured out a way to explain what had happened in court. A way that would keep her mother and her sister from whispering
behind their hands that she was every bit as human as they were, and had taken Rick back.
“Calm down, Nora,” she heard Rick say. “Zada’s in the kitchen. Go see for yourself.”
The kitchen!
This kitchen?
Have you lost your freaking mind?
Nora Thornton breezed into the kitchen before Zada could take the first step forward to stop her. Zada’s sister, Sally, breezed
in right behind her, dragging her two squirming sons by the hand. The eight-year-old managed to wrangle away from his mother
first. The six-year-old quickly followed.
Sally didn’t seem to notice the boys had jerked free from her grasp. Neither did Grandma Nora. They were both standing in
the middle of Zada’s destroyed kitchen, shocked expressions on their faces.
“Boy, were you wrong, Mom,” eight-year-old Tommy said, looking around the kitchen. “Me and Timmy could never be as messy as
Aunt Zada.”
Sally’s face flushed.
“Timmy and I,” she corrected. She looked back at Zada and shrugged. “Kids.”
“Yeah, kids,” Zada said, frowning at her sister. “Funny how they only repeat exactly what you
never
should have said.”
“This is no time for bickering, you two,” Nora scolded.
The boys ran off down the hall calling Simon’s name.
“Well?” Nora said, frowning at Zada. “Can I assume a pack of burglars ransacking your house is the reason you haven’t returned
my calls? You had to know Sally and I have been worried to death about you. The last we heard from you, you were headed off
to divorce court.”
Before Zada could answer, Nora continued, “And what’s Rick doing here if you’re here? You did get the house, I hope.”
“Not exactly,” Zada said.
“You mean Rick got the house?” Nora frowned again. “Then what are you doing here? I thought if Rick got the house, you had
to move out immediately.”
“Mom,” Sally said. “Give Zada a chance to answer.” “I,” Zada said. “Well, I mean Rick and I …”
Sally’s eyebrow came up.
“You see,” Zada began again.
“Yes,” Sally said with a knowing smile. “I think I do see what’s going on here.”
Zada said, “Rick and I are not back together, Sally.”