Sleeping With the Enemy (3 page)

One corner of his mouth turned up.  “I’ve told you what I do,” he said.  “What about you? What does Rose Kenneally do when she’s not dancing with her uncle at weddings?”

While she watched, a gull swooped down to the river’s surface and rose back up with a shimmering silver fish in its bill.  “I manage a shelter for abused women.”

A moment of silence fell as he processed her words.  “And I bet you’re like a she-wolf,” he said, “protecting her cubs.”

“Something like that.”

He took the hint and didn’t pursue that line of questioning.  Instead, he uncapped the bottle of Chianti and refilled her empty cup.  She looked at the cup, then at him.  “Tell me.  Are you planning to ply me with drink and then take advantage of me?”

He recapped the bottle.  “Yes,” he said, those dark eyes steady on hers.  “But only if it’s what you want.”

The thrill started somewhere in her stomach and shot through her on a hot jolt of adrenaline.  In the distance somewhere, a gull cried.  This was the craziest thing she’d ever done.  She didn’t even know this man.  But the sun and the river and the wine had loosened her inhibitions, and she couldn’t think of a single reason to say no when her instincts, and her body, were all screaming
yes, yes, yes!

Her stomach clenched and unclenched as he took the cup from her hand and set it on the sand beside the blanket.  She turned into his arms and into the moment they’d both been anticipating since they’d first seen each other across that wide expanse of lawn.  His mouth was hot on hers as they took their time learning the taste, the feel, the scent of each other.  Braced on his elbows, his weight a sweet heaviness upon her, he paused to study her face.

“Is this why you brought me here?” she said hoarsely.

“Yes.  And it’s why you came.”

She studied him in painstaking detail, the soft dark eyes, the smooth skin taut over his cheekbones, the pale stubble of whiskers on his jaw.  Her heart thudding, she said, “It’s broad daylight.  Anybody could see us.”

“Don’t worry.  Nobody comes here.”

“Not even some pleasure boater, floating down the river?”

“The only pleasure boater around here is my cousin Leo, and the last time I saw him, he was on his fourth glass of punch.”

“I suppose you realize,” she said lazily, “that I’m going to hell for sure.  Nice Irish Catholic girls don’t put out.”

The corner of his mouth twitched, and humor sparked in those dark eyes.  “I see.  And are you a nice Irish Catholic girl?”

Their eyes caught and held.  And then she reached up to unbutton his shirt.  “Not any more,” she said.

***

The moon rode high in the sky when he brought her back to Casey’s house.  The celebration had long since died down, most likely because the majority of the celebrants were sleeping it off somewhere.  In the vast darkness of this rural paradise, the night sounds were different from those of home.  Instead of the constant drone of traffic and the shriek of sirens, she heard the soft chirping of crickets, and the wind sighing through the trees.  In the glow from the overhead light, she leaned up against the clapboard siding of the house, hands tucked demurely behind her.  “I feel like a sixteen-year-old,” she whispered, “sneaking home after curfew.”

“I want you to know,” he said, “that what happened today—” He paused to examine her face, as though memorizing it for the future.  “—I didn’t take it lightly.”

She touched her forehead to his chin.  “Thank you.  Thank you for the most incredible afternoon of my life.”

He raised her face, kissed her forehead.  “I won’t forget it, Rose Kenneally.  Or you.”

She watched him walk back to his truck.  He opened the door, paused to look back at her.  They studied each other for a long moment, and then he climbed into the cab, started the engine, and backed the truck around.  She stood there, watching, until his tail lights disappeared from sight.

And then she steeled herself for battle.

Her mother was sitting in the wicker rocker, pretending to read a magazine.   Mary MacKenzie’s keen blue eyes took in Rose’s tangled hair, her wrinkled dress, her kiss-swollen lips, and Mary’s mouth thinned.  “Getting in pretty late, aren’t you, Rose?”

“I’m thirty-six years old, Mom.  I can come in as late as I want.”

Her mother set down the magazine.  “Luke was worried about you.”

“Well, as you can see, I’m fine.”

Mary studied her face.  “Maybe not so fine.”

“Look, don’t judge me, okay? Do you have any idea how long it’s been since—” She stopped, felt a flush crawl up her face.  At thirty-six, divorced and braless, she still couldn’t talk about sex with her mother.

“For the love of Mike, Rose, it’s not your soul I’m worried about.  It’s your heart.  And I’m not so old I don’t remember how it is between a man and a woman.”

“Then cut me some slack, Ma.  I can take care of myself.”

“I thought by now you’d be settled down.  But I’m not so sure it’ll ever happen.”

“I was settled, remember? I’m not the one who pushed Eddie out of my bed and into every other bed in town.”

“Eddie Kenneally wasn’t worth the snot from your nose,” her mother said.  “Right from the day you married him, it broke my heart to see the way he treated you.  You deserve better.  But you won’t find it, sleeping with men you don’t even know.”

“It was only one man, Mom,” she said wearily.  “Not exactly an orgy.  I suppose Dad’s furious with me, too.”

“Your father doesn’t know where you disappeared to.  I thought it more prudent not to tell him.”

Some of Rose’s anger dissipated.  She crossed the room and knelt on the floor at her mother’s feet.  “Thank you,” she said, folding her arms and resting her head on Mary’s lap. 

Mary lay a hand on Rose’s head and ran her fingers through the red curls the way she had when Rose was a small child.  “You’re still my little girl, Rose.  You don’t stop being a mother just because your little ones grow up.”

Thinking of her own kids, Rose said softly, “I know.”

“Go on in and take a shower,” her mother said.  “Get yourself put together.  And then go talk to Luke.”

***

She found Luke in one of the upstairs bedrooms, sprawled across the bed, poring over a guitar magazine.  He’d traded in the suit for torn jeans and an Aerosmith tee shirt.  “Hey, hot stuff,” she said.  “Mind if I come in?”

He shrugged.  “Whatever.”

She sat on the edge of the bed.  “Did you have fun at the wedding?”

He closed the magazine and rested his chin on his palm.  “Weddings are for dorks.  I can’t believe Uncle Rob actually wore a tux.”

She grinned.  “Neither can I.”

He returned the grin.  Luke had inherited his father’s dark good looks, but he’d gotten the MacKenzie trademark green eyes.  “Mom?” he said, suddenly serious.  “Do you think you’ll ever get married again?”

The question surprised her.  “Where’d that come from?”

He shrugged those broad but bony shoulders again, reminding her of her brother Rob at that same age.  He was built like Rob, tall and scrawny, with feet that wouldn’t stop growing.  “I’ve been thinking about it, that’s all,” he said.  “Devon starts college next year, and I’ll be off to college two years after that.” Those green MacKenzie eyes were somber.  “Dad has Heidi, and the baby.  But you don’t have anybody.”

“Aw, honey.” She brushed a wayward strand of hair back from his face.  “You’re too young to be worrying about your old mom.”

“You’re not old,” he said.  “And you still look real good, for your age.  I mean—” He paused, and blushed.  “Kyle Housman thinks you’re hot.”

She gaped at him in astonishment and began rapidly cataloguing the procession of pimply and boisterous teenage boys who regularly visited her house, trying to put a face with a name.  It finally clicked, the name and a vague image of a kid with a ponytail and gray eyes that looked as if they’d seen just a bit too much.  Cheeky little bastard.  “You tell Kyle,” she said, getting up from the bed, “that this hot old broad has forgotten things he has yet to learn.  And stop worrying about me.  I’m not good at being married, and I like my life just the way it is. 
Capisce
?”

He grinned, and in that grin she saw the little boy who had brought her flowers from the empty lot on the corner of their street.  “Loud and clear.”

She tweaked his nose.  “Twerp,” she said, and left him laughing.

chapter three

Eight Weeks Later

Boston, Massachusetts

It had been a bitch of a week.

Monday morning, halfway to work, her twelve-year-old Honda Civic coughed and sputtered and died in rush-hour traffic.  She was forced to endure forty-five minutes of furious glares from delayed commuters while she waited for a wrecker to come and haul it away.  The week went downhill from there.  Devon was pulling her Greta Garbo act, hiding out in her room and refusing to come out and be a member of the family.  Tuesday brought a parent-teacher conference with Luke’s English teacher, who told her the same story she’d been hearing since he’d entered kindergarten:  Her son had a good head on his shoulders, if only he’d come down out of the clouds long enough to apply himself.

The car was fixed on Wednesday, and Roy, the mechanic she’d come to think of as “hers” because she’d financed his recent Caribbean cruise as well as orthodontia for all three of his kids, presented her with a $400 repair bill and stood there scratching his head as she wrote out the check.

“I dunno, Mrs.  Kenneally,” he said.  “She’s getting up there, you know.  Maybe you’d be better off buying a new car.”

Rose briskly tore off the check and handed it to him.  With saccharine sweetness, she said, “And then who would put your kids through college?”

That night, she called Eddie.  “You’re ten days late with the child-support check,” she reminded him.  “Again.”

He gave her the usual song and dance about how hard they were having it, with the baby growing so fast and Heidi out of work.  Then he had the audacity to suggest that if she were a better money manager, she’d have funds left at the end of the month, and wouldn’t be dependent on his meager financial contribution.  That was what Eddie had always done.  Whenever he screwed up, he always found some way to turn it back around on her and make it look like her fault.

Through gritted teeth, she said, “Listen to me, bucko, and listen good.  Until the day they turn eighteen, you will continue to pay child support for the kids you were more than willing to make.  Or I’ll be delivering them to your door.  I’m sure there’s room for a couple more in your happy little household.  The iguana and the stereo speakers don’t take up much space.”

“Jesus Christ, Rose, I’ll put the goddamn check in the mail tomorrow.  Bleed me dry, why don’t you?”

“Why don’t you put some of your wife’s extensive talents to work? I hear they’re hiring at McDonald’s drive-thru.”

“You know, Rose, that kind of thing reminds me why we got divorced.”

“Aw, Eddie, how sweet of you to remember.  Did I ever tell you I keep your picture on the closet door in my bedroom? I use it for dart practice.”

“Go to hell, Rose.”

“Have a real nice day, Eddie.  Give my best to Lolita.”

On Thursday, the dog ate the pork chops she’d left out to thaw, foil and all, and threw up the whole nine yards in the center of her living room carpet.  After she cleaned the mess and scolded a contrite Chauncey, she threw together a tuna noodle casserole instead.  Luke turned up his nose, pulled the last ice cream sandwich from the freezer, and holed up in his room with his guitar.  Devon emerged from her lair, sniffed and rolled her eyes when she saw the gourmet fare being served, then high-tailed it out the back door.  “Where are you going?” Rose hollered after her.

“Out,” drifted back the reply, and Devon was gone.

She ate alone, with just the television for company, and as she listened to the local news anchor spouting his nightly words of doom and gloom, she wondered what had ever happened to the days when a family sat around the dinner table together, talking about the day’s events.  Nowadays, communication between family members had broken down, with everybody scattered in forty different directions, and the family unit had all but ceased to exist.  It was so depressing.

And then, on Friday, there was
Keisha.

Keisha Lincoln was little more than a child, just three years older than Devon.  The soft-spoken black woman had come to them five weeks ago with a cut lip, a fractured wrist, and two small children clinging to her slender legs.  In spite of Rose’s urging, Keisha had refused to press charges against her boyfriend, and her first few days at the shelter, she’d seemed frightened and lost, like a baby bird pushed too soon out of its nest.

But as time went by and she realized she was safe here, Keisha had come out of her shell, surprising them all with her bubbly personality and the wickedly funny caricatures she drew.  She had already done pre-testing for her GED and had scored high on every one of the tests.  She’d attended child development classes and was learning to operate a computer.  Rose had considered Keisha one of her success stories.

Now, Keisha sat in Rose’s office, her hands clasped together in her lap, her head down, her gaze fixed on the toes of her faded sneakers.  Aghast, Rose asked, “Why? Why would you go back to him after what he did to you?”

“He said he love me, Miz Kenneally,” Keisha whispered.

“And how many times has he told you that before?”

“You don’t understand.  He come to me with tears in his eyes.  He promised me he gonna change.  Said he won’t hit me no more.”

Ah, those sweet promises.  How well she remembered. 
Rosie, baby, I’m so sorry.  It won’t ever happen again, I swear to God.  You just gotta give me another chance, baby, I can’t live without you.  Here, let me get a wet cloth for that split lip.

“Damn it, Keisha, can’t you see that he’s manipulating you? And you were doing so well.  You’re just a step away from your GED.  You’re taking classes.  You could get a really good job.”