Page 87 of Midnight Valentine
“Honestly, your guess is as good as mine.”
I can almost hear her eye roll through the phone. “I know Coop gave you a letter or a note that Theo left for you. I pestered him after church to tell me what he wanted to talk to you about. So what was in the note?”
“A quote from the Bible.”
That shuts her up for a good fifteen seconds. Then she asks hopefully, “Was it a sexy quote?”
“Are there such things in the Bible?”
“I don’t know, I haven’t read the damn thing!”
“But you sit in a church every week and listen to someone who has.”
Her voice drips sarcasm. “I’ll ask the pastor if she’s been skipping all the juicy parts.”
“It was a quote about doors, if you must know, that related to something we’d been discussing earlier.” It also related to a tattoo my dead husband had on his back, but I’m trying hard not to be crazy, so we’re not going there.
Hearing my explanation, Suzanne is dubious. “So he leaves you a note about doors, then he splits for destinations unknown, then he’s back in a jiffy, tickling your lady parts? I’m not the brightest bulb, honey, but there are holes in this story bigger than my boobs.”
“In between the splitting and the tickling, I wrote him an email.”
She ponders that for a while. “Must’ve been some email.”
“Yeah, it was. So…skipping over the details—”
“Bad friend!”
“—what I can tell you is that I’ve seen him twice since he supposedly left town, but he’s not coming every day with the rest of the crew to work on the Buttercup—”
“Whoa, whoa, rewind! Hillrise is working on the Buttercup?”
“Oh. Yes. Did I leave that out?”
She groans in exasperation. “Do you even know how to do the girlfriend thing, girlfriend?”
“I’d apologize again, but I think my apologies just irritate you.”
“So does your god-awful storytelling! I’ve got a five-year-old niece who tells more coherent stories about her imaginary pet bunny, Mr. Nibbles!”
“Okay. Starting over. You were caught up to where I had a public meltdown in church. And you know Coop gave me Theo’s note, and now you know what was in it. Then, when I got home, I wrote Theo an email that basically explained how I was feeling about everything. Then later that night, he showed up and…uh…we…”
Suzanne scoffs. “Don’t pop a vessel trying to find a delicate way to say ‘We screwed our brains out,’ princess.”
I say softly, “We didn’t, though, Suzanne. We made love. Sweet, intimate, passionate love.”
She mutters, “Dear God in heaven, what did I do to deserve this shit?”
“I’ll assume that’s a rhetorical question and continue. Both times after we made love, he disapp
eared. When I woke up in the mornings, he was gone.”
She gasps in outrage. “He didn’t!”
She sounds so horrified, I feel defensive on Theo’s behalf. “But he left me flowers and a poem.” When she doesn’t respond, I sigh. “You’re right. It sounds bad when I say it out loud.”
She says sarcastically, “You think?”
“Are you deliberately trying to make me feel worse? Because it’s working.”
