Hush Money

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

KC Roth poured some white wine into her glass.

“I was about to have lunch, I could make us both something,” she said.

“Thank you, no,” I said. “Just a couple questions.”

“Did you see him?”

“Vincent?”

She smiled as if I had prayed aloud.

“I saw him,” I said. “Handsome devil.”

“Oh isn’t he,” she said. “What did he say?”

“He said he didn’t stalk you.”

“What else.”

She was sitting on the pink sofa in the bay window of her beige living room. I was back in the uncomfortable gray chair.

“Nothing of consequence,” I said. “Could you run back over the breakup.”

Her eyes filled. She sipped some more white wine.

“I don’t think I can,” she said.

“Well, let me help you focus. Who said that you would no longer sleep together.”

“What difference does it make?” she said. “It’s over.”

There were tears now on her cheeks. She wiped them with the back of her left hand.

“It might make a difference,” I said. “I know it’s painful, but think back. Who decided that you’d stop making love.”

She drank wine again and looked down at her lap and answered me so softly that I couldn’t hear her.

“Excuse me?” I said.

“I did,” she said. “I told him that if he wouldn’t leave his wife then I wouldn’t fuck him until he did.”

“Negotiating ploy?” I said.

She looked up and her eyes though teary were harder than one would have thought.

“I was desperate,” she said.

“But you meant it.”

“Well, he had to lose something too,” she said. “He couldn’t have everything. I have to leave my beautiful house and my beautiful daughter…” Now she was not just teary, now she was crying. “I have to live in this… this cell block. He can’t keep on fucking me. He has to give up something.”

“Fair’s fair,” I said.

Struggling with her crying she said, “Could you… could you come and sit beside me?”

“Sure.”

I went and sat on the couch beside her and she leaned over and put her face against my chest and sobbed. I put an arm around her shoulder and patted. Uncle Spenser, tough but oh so gentle. After a while she stopped crying, but she stayed with her. face pressed against my chest, and turned a little so she had snuggled in against me.

“So in fact you broke it off,” I said. “Not him.”

“All he had to do was leave his wife.”

“Which he wouldn’t.”

“He can’t. She’s too dependent.”

“But he’d have been willing to have you as his girlfriend.”

“Yes.”

“Being the only one cheating in fact didn’t bother him.”

She shrugged.

“No,” she said. “Sometimes I say things because they sound right.”

“Most people do,” I said.

She seemed to wriggle a little tighter against me, though I didn’t see her move.

“You’re very understanding,” she said.

“Yep.”

“And you always seem so clear.”

“Clear,” I said.

“Have you ever cheated on Susan?”

“Once. Long time ago.”

“Really?”

“Yep.”

“She ever cheat on you?”

“That would be for her to answer,” I said.

“If she did would you care?”

“Yes.”

“Did she care the time you did?”

“Yes.”

“How’d she find out?”

“I told her.”

“Would she have known if you hadn’t told her?”

“Maybe not.”

“Why did you tell her?”

“Seemed a good idea at the time,” I said.

“If you did again would she care?”

“Yes.”

“Would you tell her?”

“I’ll decide after I do it again.”

“Do you think you’ll do it again?” she said.

I couldn’t figure out how she had moved so much closer to me, since she had started out leaning on me.

“Day at a time,” I said.

My voice sounded a little hoarse. She turned her head slightly on my chest so she could look up at me. One hand kneaded my left bicep.

“You’re awfully strong, aren’t you?”

I cleared my throat.

“It’s because my heart is pure,” I said.

I was still hoarse. I cleared my throat again. Her face was so close to mine that her lips brushed my face when she spoke.

“Really?”

“Sort of pure,” I said.

She raised her head a couple of millimeters and kissed me hard on the mouth. It seemed ungallant to struggle. She pulled her head back.

“When you kiss me put your tongue in my mouth,” she said.

Her voice had thickened and grown richer, so that it had acquired the quality of butterscotch sauce. She kissed me again and opened her mouth. I kept my tongue to myself. She pressed harder. I thought that somewhere there must be laughter, as I clung to my chastity. Finally she pulled her head back and looked at me.

“Don’t you want to fuck me?” she said.

“Very respectfully, no.”

“My God, why not. I know you’re aroused.”

“You’re very desirable,” I said. “And I get aroused at green lights.”

“Then, what?”

“I’m not at liberty, so to speak.”

“My God, you’re Victorian. A Victorian prude.”

I disagreed, but arguing about my prudishness didn’t seem productive. I shrugged.

“It’s because of Susan?”

“Sure,” I said.

She had sat up and was no longer leaning against me. This was progress, it would help my arteries relax. KC poured some more white wine and drank a swallow.

“What’s so great about Susan?”

‘The way she wears her hat,“ I said. ’The way she sips her tea.”

“Seriously, what’s so special about her? I mean I’ve known her longer than you have, since we were in college. She’s so vain, for God’s sake.”

“I’m not so sure it’s vanity,” I said.

Better to be talking about Susan than about what to do with my tongue.

“Well, what the hell is it, then. Hair, makeup, clothes, exercise, diet, always has to look perfect.”

“Well,” I said, “maybe she thinks of her appearance as a work of art in progress, sort of like painting or sculpture.”

“And she’s so pretentious, for God’s sake. She’s always like lecturing.”

“And maybe not everyone gets it,” I said.

“Gets what?”

“Susan’s pretty good at irony.”

“What’s that mean?”

“She understands herself well enough to make fun of herself,” I said.

“You’ll defend her no matter what I say, won’t you?”

“Yep.”

KC got up and walked to the other side of the room and stared out the window at the blacktop parking lot behind her building.

“Do you think Louis is the stalker?”

“Could be.”

“But why would he?”

“Maybe he feels like he’s lost control of you.”

“But we love each other.”

“Not enough for him to leave his wife,” I said. “Not enough for you to sleep with him if he doesn’t.”

“Of course I won’t. Why would I give him what he wants when he won’t give me what I want.”

“I can’t think of a reason,” I said.

“Well, I don’t believe it. I don’t believe a thing you’ve said about him.”

“Just a hypothesis.”

“Why isn’t my ex a hypothesis?”

“Doesn’t seem the type,” I said.

“How the hell would you know what type he is?”

“I talked with him.”

“And you think that’s enough?”

“No, but it’s all I’ve got. I’m not a court of law here. I am allowed to go on my reactions, my guesses, my sense of people.”

“And you sense that Louis would stalk me and Burt would not?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Well, I don’t have to listen to you. And I won’t.”

“Reading cops still checking on you,” I said.

“Like you care.”

I stood. “Time to go,” I said.

“Past time.”

I walked toward the door. She turned slowly to watch me, her hands on her hips, her face flushed.

“I would have shown you things that tight-assed Susie Hirsch doesn’t even know.”

I smiled at her. “But would you have respected me in the morning?” I said.

“Prude.”

“Prudery is its own reward,” I said, and left with my head up. I did not run. I walked out the door and toward my car in a perfectly dignified manner.