Part 10 (1/2)

”So she managed to find a way to blackmail Carl. I mean, he'd been so careful before, and it hurt him because I think he really fell in love with her. He trusted her. Can you believe that? His lover cheats on her husband without his knowledge for over a year, and he trusted her. I know, I know.

”Maybe you should get a gla.s.s of water.”

I did. I got a gla.s.s of water. Halfway down, I threw it all back up into the sink. Alice, bless her, was sweet as could be, patting me on the back, asking if I needed anything. She said she would stay all night if I needed her to.

Yes, I was tempted. I'd always been curious about Alice, if she was all talk or actually had some moves to match, and now to know what Frances was really up to, the last year and a half. Wow. I was angry. I wanted to do something, anything, to get back at her. But not this. Not becoming another notch on Alice's belt. I realized the irony-me, the horndog professor, turning down s.e.x from a couple of women now. For me it was about the pursuit. The challenge. I was a poet, d.a.m.n it! It couldn't be just s.e.x for the sake of s.e.x. No, I wanted s.e.x with women who enthralled me. I wanted it to be a hard climb to the top of Mount Ecstasy. I wanted her to s.h.i.+ver at the touch of my hand. No drunken one-nighters, no ”polyamory”, no sad, lonely people doing it in order to feel anything other than the sadness and loneliness.

I told her, ”Thanks, but no. I'll be fine. Thank you.”

We stood at the kitchen sink together, me trying hard not to erupt again. Deep breaths, through the nose.

She stepped closer, touching me, and stood on her tiptoes. She kissed my cheek. ”You're playing hard to get. I would love to conquer you.”

Well...turnaround is fair play. Still, I wasn't on the menu.

Plus, she'd distracted me now. Almost made me forget about the receipt.

”Carl sent you here to get that paper, right?”

Alice rolled her eyes and smirked. ”No, it was Frances. Someone told her something about you being gone last night. But I got the wrong paper. She sent me back today once we knew you had found another place to sleep.” A sigh. ”Listen, it's okay if you've already found someone else. All I'm asking for is a couple of hours. We could do it in the shower. Frances says you guys have the best shower-”

A nice bit of mental p.o.r.n for me to think about-sudsy, all the steam, so so wet. Alice smelled like sweat and scotch right then, so a good rinsing would be appropriate. But hey, how much of our s.e.x life did Frances blab about? Made me feel shy.

”Sorry, but I'm not so sure I wouldn't end up the star of one of your home movies. I'll pa.s.s.”

”Suit yourself.”

”Frances sent you here to get the receipt and that's all.”

She looked at me for a long moment. ”You already know.”

”Try me.”

She batted her lashes. ”In case I got caught, I was going to seduce you, of course.”

I grinned. ”Some advice-maybe start poking around for a new job? Perhaps in the film business?”

Alice finished her liquor in one pull, rubbed the back of her hand across her mouth, and slinked out the door empty-handed.

On the phone, Octavia said, ”Bring the receipt over, and we'll let Pamela take it from here. And while you're at it, tie that c.u.n.t secretary to the back of your car by her hair and bring her along.”

”Hey, she was helping here. No need for that.”

”If she really wanted to help, she would testify for you.”

”But the position she's in-”

”Which one? Seems like she's in a lot of them quite often.”

”Jesus. Look, I just want to keep my house. I'm not after worldwide vengeance.”

”Would you settle for campuswide?”

I told her I would be there in an hour and hung up the phone. After that, I wandered around, trying to outsmart Frannie by guessing what she might come after next so I could take it with me. But I had a brainfart and kept re-remembering things Frances had told me during the year and half she'd been cheating. All the ”I love yous”, ”You're my one and onlys”, ”My sweetnesses”. The spontaneous s.e.x at three in the morning, sudden and pa.s.sionate, but she never had anything left for our waking hours-dinners ended early by headaches, too much grading to catch up on, preparing syllabi, trips to the gym. ”We can't schedule s.e.x, Mick. It's just not romantic.” Meanwhile, she was scheduling s.e.x all the time. Living for it.

So I stopped trying to be smart and just changed the alarm code to something she would never guess-the hour and minute Alice told me how in the dark I really was.

TWELVE.

Pamela held the receipt off to the side and leaned back in the chair before saying, ”Seriously?”

Octavia nodded. We were in the ”theater”, which was really just where she kept the sixty-inch flat screen, Bose sound system, and latest Blu-Ray technology. On the screen at the moment was a frozen image of a severed head from Andy Warhol's Frankenstein. I don't know how she could watch stuff like this. Gave me the creeps, but before she'd installed this state-of-the-art screening room in her bas.e.m.e.nt, I had silently sat through hordes of horrific films with her in the past just to be a friend, usually at midnight showings full of freaks. She doesn't go anymore-hard to fit in the seats-but waits for everything on DVD. She watches these sorts of movies to relax.

The office would've been preferable, but I believe Octavia wanted us here at this specific point in the movie in order to drive a message home: Severed head = ”Punish the b.i.t.c.h”.

”So,” Pamela continued. ”I should find this Ron Moore guy and see if he has any connection or knowledge to a robot pen, and then subpoena his records.”

”It would really help me out,” I said.

That made her laugh, more like a rumble. It was deep and throaty. You could sense the German in her. A well-built woman who could take me in any fight, anytime, with one hand behind her back. She wore a light-gray power suit, crossed her legs, and below the hem of her trouser was revealed a perfectly chiseled ankle and size ten foot wearing a magnificent Jimmy Choo high-heeled leather sandal. I only knew that because Octavia had asked about them when she first sat down. They weren't Octavia's style, I knew, but once she heard the designer, the price clicked in her head, thus another piece of info to file away about one of her closest advisors. It occurred to me that here was a woman who, no matter how b.a.l.l.sy and comfortable she appeared, felt she couldn't come over in anything less than a very powerful power suit and seven hundred dollar heels.

”Something I said?”

Pamela waved the receipt. ”You ready to proceed criminally, too? Because it's not just you versus your wife anymore. This man committed a crime. Why in the h.e.l.l would he want to own up to it?”

”If the proof is in his records, he's done anyway. I don't know, can't we threaten to turn him in unless he anonymously helps out?”

She dipped her chin. ”What's a judge going to say to that? Really, think ahead, dear.”

I smoothed my hair across my scalp, one two three times, trying not to raise my voice. ”I just want to keep my house.”

”I don't know if you can without putting a whole bunch of people in jail or on the front page.”

I never knew if her folksiness was a put-on. You could certainly hear the dirt in her voice, from having been raised on a farm in South Dakota, and it carried a powerful punch.

And through all this, Octavia didn't say a word. Didn't even look at us.

”Pam, I'm not a lawyer-”

”Got that right.”