It's A Wonderfully Sexy Life (6 page)

“Okay, okay, I get the point. Thanks. You look pretty amazing yourself.” Self-conscious, Mandy darted a look around to the twenty-and thirtysomethings congregating in the living room and camped out around the dining room food table before slipping off her three-quarter length belted black wool dress coat, a loan from her sister, Sharon.

Without the outerwear, she felt if not exactly naked, certainly closer to that state than she usually came, in public anyway. The dress’s low neckline left little to the imagination, especially with the lacy black push-up bra underneath. She couldn’t help wishing Josh had gotten to see her like this, looking her best—okay hot—rather than in her sexless police uniform, not that he’d seemed to mind.

Suz took her coat and hung it inside the jammed closet. Turning back, she said, “Beer and wine are in the kitchen along with someone I want you to meet.”

Another fix-up, oh shit
. Some detective she’d turn out to be, she hadn’t even seen that one coming.

Mandy shook her head so hard she nearly knocked off one of her mother’s vintage faux pearl-and-diamond clip-ons. Reaching up to secure the earring, she said, “I told you, I’m swearing off men.”

“Not in that dress you’re not.” Grinning, Suz hooked her arm through Mandy’s and started towing them toward the back of the house.

Mandy tried digging her heels, her
high
heels, into the beige wall-to-wall, but it was no use. Her friend was on a mission. They came up on the kitchen alcove, and Suz dropped her voice and said, “See the Italian hunk standing by the beer cooler talking to my brother Joey?”

Mandy followed the less than subtle head jerk to the beefy bodybuilder sipping from a bottle of Miller and talking to Suz’s younger brother. “Italian
hulk
, you must mean.”

Standing at medium height, the man had the tree-trunk neck and wide-legged stance of someone who pumped iron in a serious way. She doubted there was an ounce of fat on him, and yet he looked as though he might split the seams of his black T-shirt and trousers at any minute. At one time, she might have found all that bulky muscle a turn-on, but now she couldn’t help thinking how much sexier Josh’s taller, leaner body had been.

Leaning in, Suz whispered, “His name’s Danny Romero, and he owns a gym downtown.”

“A gym, huh?” One look at her and he’d probably tell Suz to lock up the party food. “That’s nice.”

Suz scowled. “Nice! Show a little more enthusiasm, can’t we? He’s gorgeous, owns his own business and, Mandy, he’s single—never married, in fact.”

“I guess that makes him almost a relationship virgin, huh?”

Rather than answer, Suz shoved her through the kitchen door and into the hulk’s granite chest. “Danny, this is my best friend in the world, Mandy Delinski. Mandy, this is Danny Romero, a buddy of Joey’s.”

Before anyone had the chance to say another word, Suz grabbed her baby brother by the arm and all but dragged him out of the kitchen.

Stranded, Mandy stepped back from the hard slab of chest and looked up. “Hi.”

“How you doin’?” His gaze slipped to her breasts, recently flattened against him, and stayed there. “So you’re Suz’s friend, the woman cop?”

The woman cop. Nice
. Teeth gritted, Mandy answered, “Yeah, at least until those sex change hormones kick in.”

He hesitated and then threw back his head and chuckled, a loud braying that made her want to cover her ears even as she thought how much nicer Josh’s laughter had sounded. “You’re funny. I like that.”

So glad I have your approval
. “Thanks. If this
woman
cop thing doesn’t work out, I figure I can always fall back on stand-up comedy.”

He grinned, revealing what had to be professionally whitened teeth. “Want a drink?”

What the hell, it was a New Year’s Eve party. If she was going to be trapped here until midnight, she might as well partake and, at any rate, she was walking home. Perusing the bank of open wine bottles set out on the kitchen table, she said, “Sure. I’ll have a—”

She stopped when he reached down into the cooler, pulled out a Miller Lite, and popped the cap without asking her preference. Murmuring a thank-you, she accepted the beer, thinking how politely Josh had treated her on their short but sweet date, opening doors, carrying her coffee to their table along with his, standing around in the cold to make sure she got her car started.

As the night wore on, the comparisons continued. Whereas Josh had wanted to know about her, it was obvious Danny was more interested in having an audience, a
captive
audience of one, hear all about him. Knocking back the beers he kept handing her, Mandy listened in silence as he went on about his problems keeping a decent aerobics instructor on staff—they were all “bimbos,” according to him—his plans for expanding the facility to include a juice bar and separate rooms for spinning and yoga classes, his personal diet and weight training program because hey, you don’t get to look like this without workin’ at it. When the latter segued into a bragging fest on how many pounds he could bench press, Mandy decided she’d heard more than enough.

Alcohol buzzing through her bloodstream, she set down her empty beer bottle—was it her third or fourth—and said, “You know, it’s a little warm in here.”
Must be from all the hot air
. “I’m going to step outside for a moment.”

“Get some fresh air, that’s a great idea. I’ll keep you company seeing as how I’m, uh…hot, too.” His leer and the fact that his eyes were still pinned to her breasts left no doubt as to what kind of company he was offering.

Conceited asshole, he was so stuck on himself he probably thought she was hinting she wanted to make out with him.
I may be a fat woman but as far as making out with you goes, fat chance, buddy.

“Thanks but I’m kind of a solo breather. My…er, yoga instructor likes me to keep it that way.”

His smile dropped to the ground like one of his precious barbells. For one of the few times that night, he actually looked her in the eye. “But it’ll be midnight in five minutes. You can’t tell me you want to ring in the New Year all by your lonesome. Might be unlucky or…something.” He reached for her, but she took a quick step back.

“I’ll take my chances.” She snatched her evening purse off the Corian counter and made a beeline for the doorway.

Out in the living room, guests wearing paper party hats and pre-testing noisemakers and confetti congregated around the big screen TV, tuned in to the countdown for the ball to drop in New York’s Times Square. She made her way over to Suz, who was circulating with a bottle of champagne.

She looked up from the plastic glassware she was filling and grinned. “Is that Danny something else or what?”

Mandy nodded. “He’s, uh…definitely something all right.”

Suz must have caught the sarcasm in her voice because her smile fell. “You two hit it off, right? You must have because you’ve been standing in that same spot for hours.”

“Only because it took me that long to get a word in, and once I did I decided to make it goodbye.” Mandy dragged a hand through her hair, too frustrated to care about messing up the curls. “It’s a great party, really it is, but I’m just not in a party mood. I shouldn’t have come. Look, I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?” She turned to go.

Suz trailed her to the front door. “But Mandy, you can’t go now.”

Fed up with being told what she could or couldn’t do, Mandy swung around. Flinging her arms out at her sides, she said, “I know, I know, it’s almost midnight, and who wants to ring in the New Year alone, right? Well, you know who? Me. I do. Call me Garbo, but the truth is I want to be alone.” Taking the silver screen diva’s famous quote as her exit line, she turned her back on Suz and the roomful of suddenly silent guests and yanked open the front door.

She stepped out onto the marble steps, her breath forming whitish clouds in the frigid air. Rubbing her bare arms, she asked herself what the hell was the matter with her. Had she suddenly become the biggest bitch on the planet or had the events of the past week taken a heavier toll on her than she’d cared to admit? Either way, there was no excusing her rudeness, especially when Suz had been trying to help. As soon as she pulled herself together, she’d go back inside and apologize, grab her coat and head for home. Hell, while she was on a roll, she might as well track down Danny, Mr. Wonderful, and apologize to him, too, before her buzz wore off.

Overblown ego aside, Danny was what most women from her neighborhood would consider a catch—good-looking, single and a successful business owner. He’d even seemed sort of interested in her, her breasts at least. The bigger problem wasn’t him, she admitted, but her. Even if he’d been the greatest conversationalist on the planet, she still wouldn’t have been able to look at him without mentally morphing his dark eyes into blue ones, his black hair into sandy blond, and his stocky build into a leaner, taller frame. Because no matter how great Danny or any other man might be, he would never be Josh. No one would. There was only one Josh Thornton and the damned shame was that by now he was planted six feet underground somewhere in Boston.

A splash struck her cheek. She looked up, expecting to see rain or snow, but the sky was clear and after a few seconds she realized what she’d felt wasn’t precipitation but her own tear. Wiping it away, she noted the absence of the moon in the canvas of black sky. Recalling the lunar notation on her wall calendar, she knew it was a new moon, that time of the month when it cycled through all the other signs of the zodiac to align with the sun. The start of the next lunar phase, it was supposed to be the optimal time for pursuing fresh starts and seeking future possibilities.

In the past, she’d written off astrology as New-Age woo-woo, but standing on Suz’s stoop, she desperately needed to believe in something—in the possibility of happy endings and magic and make-believe; in the power of wishing. Only what she wished for wasn’t to move forward with her future but instead to retrace her steps and go back—back in time. Back one week to that magical, fateful Christmas Eve, only this time when Josh asked her to come home with him, she’d answer yes, yes,
yes!
Hindsight being twenty-twenty, she’d do everything possible and then some to make sure he stayed safe and alive for that Boston trial even if that meant locking him in a room and herself right along with him—especially if it meant that.

“Ten, nine, eight, seven…” From inside the house, collective voices chanted out the countdown to a new year.

She squeezed her eyes tightly closed. “Please, God, and Mother Mary, too, if any of you are up there listening, this wish is for Josh, and for me, too, I guess.”

“Six, five, four…”

“If there’s anything you can do to intervene, anything at all, please make him not be dead.”

“Three, two, one—Happy New Year!”

Mandy opened her eyes, an explosion of noisemakers and joyous shouts sounding off at her back. Holding her breath, she looked down at the watch on her right wrist. It was indeed midnight. The date on her digital watch had flipped forward to January 1, 2007. Forward, not backward. Had she really expected it to say 2006?

Those beers must have hit me a lot harder than I thought.

Not only was she on a crying jag, but she apparently was delusional, too. She’d actually had herself believing she could turn back time just by wishing, or actually, praying.
Man, I had better get home and fast.
She dug a Kleenex out of her purse and dabbed it beneath her eyes. Dropping the balled-up tissue inside, she snapped the bag closed and chanced one last look up at the sky.

“Happy New Year, Josh, wherever you are.”

She turned to go back inside and say her other goodbyes.

Number of hunky potential boyfriends raised Lazarus-like from the dead: one but hallelujah and praise be!