She leaned forward and turned on the ignition.
“You really are sweet,” she said again, right before she peeled out of the station.
But then half a block away, she forgot all about the dweeb.
All she could think about was the neat little plan that had just now come to her.
She figured, this time in the afternoon, he’d probably be going home.
She didn’t have much trouble finding him. Just pulled up behind him at a stoplight.
And tapped her horn with the heel of her hand.
He looked back in his rearview and saw her there. His blood pressure was probably soaring.
He didn’t honk back, didn’t wave, didn’t let on in any way at all that he knew her.
When the light changed, he pulled away from the stoplight and started down the street toward home.
She started down the avenue, too.
And that was how it went for the next twenty minutes. She just stayed right on him.
Finally, when he was about halfway home, her cell phone rang and he said, angrily, “Just what the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“Just going for a ride.”
“This isn’t funny.”
“Chill out. Wow.”
He broke the connection.
She thought of maybe giving him a break, of only following him for a block more, and then falling away.
But she was having too much fun.
She followed him all the way home, and then, just to really scare the shit out of him, she pulled into his driveway and honked the horn.
His neighbor, a gray-haired lady filling her side-yard bird feeder, looked out to see who was honking.
The red Triumph wasn’t a car she was likely to forget.
The Senator got out of his car and virtually ran into the screened-in back porch.
But by then, Darcy was bored.
She’d had as much fun as she could possibly get out of this situation.
2
“I just had to show you this outfit,” Sally Frazier said to Amy. “Isn’t it fun?”
Sally was a private-practice lawyer who specialized in divorce and estate law. In a town like Crystal Falls, a lawyer had to offer a range of services to survive.
Sally had pulled into the drive just as Amy was getting into her jeans and T-shirt for the night. Tuna fish sandwich, salad, and a small slice of cheesecake were to be the evening’s repast.
Sally was a short, slight woman with a tight cap of auburn curls. She was more cute than pretty — the dreaded word “perky” was frequently applied to her — and she had a tendency to pile on the pounds... and then lose them by some kind of deal with the devil. Every Crystal Falls woman over twenty-five envied her. Yes, she could pack the pounds on... and shed them with ease.
The outfit was a “cow-gal” special with western shirt, vest, skirt, and boots, each with ample supplies of fringe. The white cowboy hat, which contrasted nicely with the velvet blue of the outfit, was perched at a cute angle on her head. She looked darling.
“If he doesn’t like this, I give up,” Sally said. The past month, she’d been dating a recently divorced man she’d met at the Friday night barn dance. They’d had several dates and the guy hadn’t so much as tried to kiss her. Sally had speculated on this. The guy was everything from impotent to gay to a murderer who got himself worked up into an ax-wielding frenzy whenever he had sex. Sally read an awful lot of serial-killer novels.
“Well, you think this’ll do the trick?”
“It should,” Amy said.
“I’ve never heard of a case before where the woman has to give the guy Spanish fly, have you?”
Amy laughed. “Boy, there’s a phrase I haven’t heard since high school.”
“Dick Hamer tried to convince me he’d put some Spanish fly in my Pepsi one night.”
“Dick Hamer? I only vaguely remember him.”
“He was in training to be a serial rapist. I used to go to the drive-in with him. That’s how I got interested in wrestling.”
This was pure Sally, joke after joke. She was fun but Amy found herself occasionally needing a rest from Sally and her humor.
“So how about you, toots?” Sally said. “You going to break down and go to the dance the way Sam wants you to?”
Amy had told her about seeing Sam earlier.
“I don’t think so,” Amy said.
“You want me to talk you into it, don’t you, kiddo?”
Amy smiled. “Maybe I do.”
“He’s a hell of a nice guy.”
“Yes, he is.”
“And pretty sexy, too.”
“I couldn’t disagree with that.”
“And, kiddo, best of all, he wants to marry you. He told me that himself.”
“He did?”
“Uh-huh.”
“When?”
“A week or so ago in the Pizza Hut. The eunuch and I were in there getting a pizza. Sam came over and sat down. So of course we talked about you and he said he wanted to marry you. He’s serious, kiddo. He really is.”
“It’s just—”
Sally shook her head. “Don’t tell me it’s just Richie.” She took Amy’s hand and held it for a moment. “Toots, you know there’s a possibility that Sam’s version of things is the truth.”
Amy withdrew her hand, saying, “I’d rather not talk about it.”
“See. See how uptight you get? All I did was mention that night and you turn into a hermit.”
A knock on the back door. Through the red-and-white checked curtains, Amy could see Jimmy.
She walked over to the door and opened it.
“I’m all done, Amy.”
“Good, Jimmy. I appreciate it. Step inside and I’ll go get your money.”
She always paid him in cash, a crisp new twenty, a crisp new five. He accepted checks, but when you gave him cash, he seemed incredibly proud of himself, as if he’d just been handed a major award.
“You know Sally, don’t you, Jimmy?” Amy said as she reached in the cupboard for where she always kept Jimmy’s money in an envelope.
The two said hello to each other.
“Oh, and you could do me a favor,” Amy said, taking a loaf of bread from the counter. “You could drop this off at Richie’s place.”
“Sure,” Jimmy said. “I like going to Richie’s place.”
Amy smiled at Jimmy’s sweet innocence. In some ways, it wasn’t sad at all. In some ways, it was enviable.
Amy baked bread twice a week. It was good, no chemicals or preservatives, made in a bread maker Sam had bought for her last Christmas.
She wrapped the loaf in GLAD wrap and then carried it over to Jimmy. Richie lived in a rented A-frame out near Hartson’s Woods. Jimmy lived right down the road in an old shack. A lot of people offered to take Jimmy in but he always declined. He loved his old shack. It was close to Bevins Creek, where he liked to fish.
“Here’s for your usual great job,” Amy said, handing him the new bills.
As usual, a very pleased smile broke on his face. It really was like some kind of honors ceremony. He folded the money very neatly in half and then stuck it in his shirt pocket.
“I’ll remember about the bread,” he said.
“Thanks.”
“And don’t worry,” he joked, smiling like a little kid. “I won’t eat none of it, either.”
Amy laughed. “I wasn’t really worried about that, Jimmy.”
“I was just joking, Amy.”
She leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. “I knew you were joking, Jimmy.”
He looked self-conscious now and she was sorry if she’d made him uncomfortable.
“Thanks again, Jimmy.”
Jimmy nodded and left.
“You sure are nice to him,” Sally said.
“He makes it easy.”