Her Better Half. C.J. Carmichael

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СКАЧАТЬ fun, Lauren. “Thanks again for inviting me.”

      “Hey, we’re going to be neighbors. We might as well get to know each other.”

      Erin lapsed into silence, apparently in no hurry on the getting-to-know-one-another plan.

      Shaded from the sun, relaxing in the chair, sipping the cold tea…I finally felt myself loosen up. Looking over the scene before me, my attention was caught by a big black shape in the front window. “You have a piano. Do you play?”

      “Mommy teaches the piano,” Shelley said, crumbs clinging to the baby down on her cheeks.

      “Really?”

      “My students generally come in the evenings, some after school, others after dinner. I hope the noise won’t bother you too much.”

      A piano teacher! The instant relief I felt cooled me more than any beverage ever could. My next-door neighbor was a piano teacher. That would teach me to judge people based on appearances.

      “Mommy works at night, too,” Shelley volunteered. “Sometimes all night long. It’s dodgy and I haffta stay with Lacey or sometimes Murphy.”

      Oh no. Alarmed and embarrassed, I wasn’t sure where to look. To my surprise, though, Erin just laughed.

      “Who told you Mommy’s work was dodgy?”

      “Lacey did. She says one day the police are going to come knocking at our door.”

      “That old busybody.” Erin brushed crumbs from her daughter’s overalls. “My work isn’t dodgy. Lacey only wishes it was.”

      “Why does she wish it was, Mommy?”

      “’Cause she’s bored and lonely and needs something to think about.”

      “Lacey isn’t lonely. She has lots of cats.”

      “Exactly.” Erin turned to me. “Have you met our lovely Lacey yet? She likes to bring cookies over to new neighbors so she can check them out.”

      “She came by about five minutes after we arrived with the moving truck,” I admitted. A short, ditzy-looking woman with frizzy hair and round glasses that had reminded the girls of Harry Potter.

      “She lives across the street.” Erin pointed at the yellow house directly opposite us. “The place has a cat door. Animals run in and out all the time. Whenever she spends the night, Shelley comes home covered in cat hair. Fortunately she doesn’t have allergies. At least, not yet. Do your daughters babysit?”

      Though I’d anticipated this question earlier, now I felt taken off guard. Shelley was a sweet little girl, but I wasn’t sure I wanted the twins to babysit for Erin until I knew more about her home situation.

      “Are they twins? How old are they?” Erin asked.

      Trapped, I answered, “Fifteen.”

      This was all Gary’s fault. If he hadn’t deserted us, I wouldn’t be in this situation, trying to find a polite excuse for not allowing our daughters to babysit so that this woman could—

      What? Have sex for money? Sell drugs in dark alleys?

      “Well, if they’re interested in babysitting, I could sure use a backup for Lacey. I own my own business,” Erin finally explained. “Creative Investigations.”

      “Is it…do you mean you’re a private investigator?”

      Erin nodded and my interest was piqued. I’d loved mystery novels since I’d devoured volumes of Encyclopedia Brown as a kid.

      But books were one thing. Real life investigations were undoubtedly something different. “That sounds like it could be slightly…” I checked to see if Shelley was listening, but the little girl had moved to the far end of the porch and was playing with LEGO. I lowered my voice to a whisper. “…dangerous?”

      Erin laughed. “Not at all. I never take on anything with the potential to get, you know, messy.”

      “The late-night assignments Shelley mentioned…?”

      “Stakeouts. Sounds exciting, but trust me, they’re not. Mostly I’m just out to catch cheaters. Adultery. Insurance fraud. You know, dull stuff like that.”

      Dull stuff?

      “Hey, do you have the time?”

      I checked the gold bracelet on my arm. “Almost one.”

      “Good.” She pulled a bottle of vodka out from under her chair. “What do you say, Lauren?”

      Vodka before dinner on a Tuesday afternoon?

      I couldn’t make up my mind about Erin Karmeli. One minute she seemed okay, just another mother, like me. The piano teaching was certainly respectable enough. But Erin was also a private investigator, who looked like a hooker and might possibly be an alcoholic as well as a drug addict.

      On the other hand…like it or not, this woman was now my closest neighbor. And this was my new life. And when in Rome…

      “Sure.” I held up my glass. “I wouldn’t mind a little.”

      CHAPTER 2

       I n high school I had known girls like Erin. They hadn’t been my friends, but I’d seen them in the hallways—usually tucked under the arm of a hot football player. In class those girls sat at the back of the room, painting their nails and passing notes—usually to the hot football player sitting next to them.

      Though these back-of-the-room girls seemed steeped in self-confidence and sophistication, I—with my high grades, tidy bedroom and a best friend I’d had since kindergarten—had somehow felt superior to them.

      At sixteen, I’d thought I had life all figured out. Life rewarded those who made smart choices. Smart choices included obtaining a post-secondary education, marrying a hardworking, responsible man, making a beautiful home, and raising children.

      Follow the rules and you’ll be happy.

      For more than forty years that philosophy had worked for me. Or so I’d thought.

      Maybe the girls at the back of the class had had the right idea all along.

      I gulped my first glass of tea and vodka like it was water. The warmth of the afternoon sun seeped through my clothing and skin, right into my bones, and it felt good. I sank lower in my chair, deliberately not thinking about the boxes waiting to be unpacked, the beds to be made, the cupboards to be washed out and restocked with staples from flour to vanilla extract. Artificial extract, now.

      Erin mixed me another drink.

      “So, Lauren, what’s your deal? You don’t wear a wedding ring. You divorced?”

      It was an obvious question, one I should have expected, yet I could feel my defenses rising. I hated telling people I was divorced. It made me feel like such a loser.

      After Gary СКАЧАТЬ