Then there were all the ramifications and complications that would entail. In addition, their universe was finite. They worked for the same person in the same business. It wasn't the sort of atmosphere where
two people could have an adult affair without everyone around them knowing they were having it.
So she'd have to think about that, and just how uncomfortable it might be to have her private life as public knowledge.
After dinner, they walked over to Beale Street to join the nightly carnival. Tourists, Memphians out on the town, couples, and"clutches of young people wandered the street lit by neon signs. Music trickled
out of doorways, and people flooded in and out of shops.
"Used to be a club along here called the Monarch. Those shoes going to give you any trouble with this?"
"No."
"Good. Great legs, by the way."
"Thanks. I've had them for years."
"So, the Monarch," he continued. "Happened it shared a back alley with an undertaker. Made it easy
for the owners to dispose of gunshot victims."
"That's a pretty piece of Beale Street trivia."
"Oh, there's plenty more. Blues, rock—it's the home of both—voodoo, gambling, sex, scandal, bootleg whiskey, pickpockets, and murder."
Music pumped out of a club as he talked, and struck Stella as southern-fried in the best possible way.
"It's all been right here," he continued. "But you oughta just enjoy the carnival the way it is now."
They joined a crowd lining the sidewalk to watch three boys do running flips and gymnastics up and down the center of the street.
"I can do that." She nodded toward one of the boys as he walked on his hands back to their tip box.
"Uh-huh."
"I can. I'm not going to demonstrate here and now, but I certainly can. Six years of gymnastic lessons.
I can bend my body like a pretzel. Well, half a pretzel now, but at one time..."
"You trying to get me hot?"
She laughed. "No."
"Just a side effect, then. What does half a pretzel look like?"
"Maybe I'll show you sometime when I'm more appropriately dressed."
"You are trying to make me hot."
She laughed again and watched the performers. After Logan dropped money in the tip box, they strolled along the sidewalk. "Who's Betty Paige and why is her face on these shirts?"
He stopped dead. "You've got to be kidding."
"I'm not."
"I guess you didn't just live up north, you lived up north in a cave. Betty Paige, legendary fifties pinup and general sex goddess."
"How do you know? You weren't even born in the fifties."
"I make it a point to learn my cultural history, especially when it involves gorgeous women who strip. Look at that face. The girl next door with the body of Venus."
"She probably couldn't walk on her hands," Stella said, and casually strolled away when he laughed.
They walked off the wine, and the meal, meandering down one side of the street and back up the
other. He tempted her with a blues club, but after a brief, internal debate she shook her head.
"I really can't. It's already later than I'd planned. I've got a full day tomorrow, and I've imposed on
Roz long enough tonight."
"We'll rain-check it."
"And a blues club will go on my list. Got more checks tonight. Beale Street and catfish. I'm practically
a native now."
"Next thing you know you'll be frying up the cat and putting peanuts in your Coke."
"Why in the world would I put peanuts in my Coke? Never mind." She waved him away as he drove
out of town. "It's a southern thing. How about if I just say I had a good time tonight?"
"That'll work."
It hadn't been complicated, she realized, or boring, or stressful. At least not after the first few minutes. She'd forgotten, or nearly, what it could be like to be both stimulated and relaxed around a man.
Or to wonfler, and there was no point pretending she wasn't wondering, what it would be like to have those hands—those big, work-hardened hands—on her.
Roz had left lights on for her. Front porch, foyer, her own bedroom. She saw the gleam of them as they drove up, and found it a motherly thing to do. Or big sisterly, Stella supposed, as Roz wasn't nearly old enough to be her mother.
Her mother had been too busy with her own life and interests to think about little details like front porch lights. Maybe, Stella thought, that was one of the reasons she herself was so compulsive about them.
"Such a beautiful house," Stella said. "The way it sort of glimmers at night. It's no wonder she loves it."
"No place else quite like it. Spring comes in, the gardens just blow you away."
"She ought to hold a house and garden tour."
"She used to, once a year. Hasn't done it since she peeled off that asshole Clerk. I wouldn't bring it up," he said before Stella spoke. "If she wants to do that kind of thing again, she will."
Knowing his style now, Stella waited for him to come around and open her door. "I'm looking forward
to seeing the gardens in their full glory. And I'm grateful for the chance to live here a while and have the kids exposed to this kind of tradition."
"There's another tradition. Kiss the girl good night."
He moved a little slower this time, gave her a chance to anticipate. Those sexy nerves were just
beginning to dance over her skin when his mouth met hers.
Then they raced in a shivering path to belly, to throat as his tongue skimmed over her lips to part them. His hands moved through her hair, over her shoulders, and down her body to her hips to take a good, strong hold.
Muscles, she thought dimly. Oh, God. He certainly had them. It was like being pressed against warm, smooth steel. Then he moved in so she swayed back and was trapped between the wall of him and the door. Imprisoned there, her blood sizzling as he devastated her mouth, she felt fragile and giddy, and
alive with need.
"Wait a minute," she managed. "Wait."
"Just want to finish this out first."
He wanted a great deal more than that, but already knew -he'd have to hold himself at a kiss. So he
didn't intend to rush through it. Her mouth was sumptuous, and that slight tremor in her body brutally erotic. He imagined himself gulping her down whole, with violence, with greed. Or savoring her nibble
by torturous nibble until he was half mad from the flavor.
When he eased back, the drugged, dreamy look in her eyes told him he could do either. Some other
time, some other place.
"Any point in pretending we're going to stop things here?"
"I can't—"
"I don't mean tonight," he said when she glanced back at the door.
"Then, no, there'd be no point in that."
"Good."
"But I can't just jump into something like this. I need to—"
"Plan," he finished. "Organize."
"I'm not good at spontaneity, and spontaneity—this sort—is nearly impossible when you have two children."
"Then plan. Organize. And let me know. I'm good at spontaneity." He kissed her again until she felt her knees dissolve from the knee down.
"You've got my numbers. Give me a call." He stepped back. "Go on inside, Stella. Traditionally, you don't just kiss the girl good night, you wait until she's inside before you walk off wondering when you'll have the chance to do it again."
"Good night then." She went inside, drifted up the stairs, and forgot to turn off the lights.
She was still floating as she started down the hall so the singing didn't register until she was two paces away from her sons' bedroom.
She closed the distance in one leap. And she saw, she saw the silhouette, the glint of blond hair in the nightlight, the gleam of eyes that stared into hers.
The cold hit her like a slap, angry and sharp. Then, it, and she, were gone.
On unsteady legs, she rushed between the beds, stroked Gavin's hair, Luke's. Laid her hands on their cheeks, then their backs as she'd done when they were infants. A nervous mother's way to assure