Polished Slick (Natural Beauty) (16 page)

“No. I’ve got to catch up on work. Got some orders due.”

Odd.

“Okay.” A few more steps. “Hey, Trin?”

“Yeah?” she responded blandly.

“Are you going to the beach this weekend?”

“I don’t know. It’s up to Aunt Ginger.” She fondled the end of the broad grosgrain ribbon she’d used as a headband that day.

It was different. Something new. He liked it.

“I don’t like going by myself.”

He nodded and spun back around. Whatever was bugging her, he’d have to ferret it out later.

When he reached the front, he extended a hand and let the fireman shake it. “So, who is this guy?”

“Well, I only know what the police told me, since I forwarded the information to them so they can make the arrest. If they can find the guy, that is. He ain’t from around here.”

“I bet Jerry can find him,” Nikki said glibly.

“Who is he?” Jerry asked.

“Well, some guy named Preston Terry. Lives in Reno.”

“
Reno
.”

Nikki nodded sagely. She probably knew
exactly
what Jerry was getting at. They had a little
problem
out west.

“Dropped out of school in tenth grade then got his GED. Was in the Army for about fifteen minutes fifteen years ago, and has been working hourly security jobs and bouncing at nightclubs ever since. Been arrested a few times for using excessive force, but nothing else too major.”

“Interesting.”

“Yep, he ain’t been back to work, so he may still be around. Police will probably be back in touch with y’all soon, but I just wanted to let you know that much. I know how you are, Nikki. Everyone in town knows how you ran that last gal outta here.”

Nikki put her hand against her heart and dropped her jaw. “Now Alonzo, you know good and well all I did was talked to her. Besides, I get the sneaking suspicion she’s behind our current string of troubles.”

“Well, as far as I know we ain’t got nothin’ to tie
her
to the crime.”

“Don’t need to.” Jerry shrugged.

“Come on, now. Nikki, Jerry, I know y’all are quite capable, but if she needs jail time, you need to do this the right way. I’m sure your insurance company would like to have some legitimate arrest records so they have something to attach to the claims.”

“Oh, I haven’t made any claims, Alonzo,” Nikki said calmly, rubbing her belly like some sort of worry stone. “I don’t plan to if I can help it.”

“Shit.” He directed his gaze to Jerry. “Look, I’m just here as a courtesy to pass on some info. Y’all keep y’all’s shenanigans under wrap, hear?”

“You know I’m always discreet, Lon.”

“Keep on bein’ that way.” Alonzo gave Gramma Stacy a solicitous wink on his way out, and was gone.

Nikki gave Jerry the
Go ahead
look.

He nodded. “Now or after work?”

She chewed at the inside of her mouth while she thought, staring up at the ceiling. “After work. Need the site finished. But damned if I’m not curious.”

* * *

“Look, Mother. You won’t believe this. I just got a web alert. This company updated their website, and this name and picture came up with it.” Ben Thys held his laptop out in his arms while his mother, Clara, finished pegging the wet sheet she was struggling with up onto the clothesline.

She dried her hands on her utility apron and approached her son with caution.

“Is this another one of your tricks?” she asked in Dutch, narrowing her eyes at him. “Is it like last time when you tricked me with that photo?”

He sighed. That had been ages ago. “No, I swear, this picture is real. The site is real.”

“I’m an old woman. My heart can’t take it.”

“You’re fifty-two.”

“Yes, very old, unmarried hag.”

“Did you stop taking your pills again?”

“No.”

“You seem especially pessimistic today.”

“Wouldn’t you be?”

He shrugged and closed the laptop lid. “I suppose so. What do you want me to do?”

“Write the letter like I told you before.”

“Are you sure you don’t want to write it and let me translate it?”

“No. You write it. I don’t know what to say, but you know how I feel. Perhaps that will be enough.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Trinity dug her feet into the sand, and pulled her floppy hat a little bit further down on her head. She gave her shoulders and arms one more just-in-case spray of sunblock, and settled into her beach chair to read a sweet romance.

She’d started with something hot, and then decided her lack of an outlet after reading it would only compound her sexual frustration.

Although Ginger had decided to skip the beach for the weekend to instead head into Raleigh for shopping, Trinity had wanted to get away. Her phone wouldn’t stop ringing, and every time one of her acquaintances asked, “Is that guy you’re with on the website
really
Jerry Rouse?” she felt her blood pressure spike to stroke-inducing levels.

“Yes,” she had impatiently answered through her clenched teeth. “It’s Jerry.” And then she’d cut them off with, “We work together and
no
we are not a couple.”

And they probably never would be if Jerry were looking for a girl who cooked and decorated and could plot out a pretty garden. If he wanted someone who could run a home, he had the wrong Jordan woman by two generations.

Trinity’s grandmother Irene held the reigning title of queen of domesticity…and also had ninety out of one hundred-twenty required credits to earn an accountancy degree. She’d gleefully dropped out of school the moment she had a wedding to plan. Trinity had been ashamed to learn of it.

Then there was Ginger. She was the absolute antithesis of conservative Irene. She had always worked, even when she didn’t have to. “There’s nothing worse than a good mind going to waste,” she’d said.

Trinity had made the mistake of repeating that line to Irene during one of their quarterly phone calls when she was fifteen.

Irene had raged, and called Ginger a “socialist whackadoo” which Trinity didn’t understand at the time. All Trinity knew was she didn’t want to be like
that
. She had a choice. She’d be a Ginger, not an Irene. Perhaps even more Ginger than
Ginger
was.

All throughout Trinity’s childhood, a lot of nights their meals had been whatever take-out Ginger picked up on the way home from work. She hired out her housecleaning, and paid a landscaper to cut the grass and refresh her flowerbeds each season. It wasn’t that Ginger didn’t have the inclination to do those things. In fact, she’d proven herself to be a marvelous baker when she had the time. She simply didn’t put domestic chores high on her list of priorities. She felt no guilt about hiring out. With every check she wrote to the cleaning service, she chuckled and called it “economic stimulus.”

Trinity thought Jerry wanted a woman who could take care of him, and she could hardly take care of herself.

She sighed, and tried to focus her eyes on the blurring lines of her novel once more. “Friggin’ Jerry.”

Damn it, why’d he have to be so good-looking? And why did she have to notice after all that time? If he’d just been smart or just been athletic, she might have been able to resist him as she had for much of the past two years. But to be gorgeous, to have a body like that
and
be one of the most intelligent people she’d ever met? It hardly seemed fair. He was perfect.

“He probably needs someone closer to his age,” she mumbled, turning the page although she hadn’t even managed to read the previous one.

The non-reading went on for another half hour. She mostly stared at the people frolicking in the waves, unseeing. Then she decided to pack it in and head back to the beach house, hardly noticing by then the beach was mostly deserted—unusual for midday.

She planned a cool shower, and then perhaps she’d lie on the sofa for the rest of the afternoon watching ’80s movies. There was also the sherbet behind the mini party quiches in the freezer. Ginger had done a bad job of hiding it. Trinity made the sherbet a priority.

She’d just managed to get the beach gear into the little shed out back when her phone rang from the folds of her sarong.

“Hello?”

“Hey, pixie, where are you?” It was Jerry. His voice sounded clipped, but concerned.

“I’m in Corolla. Why?”

He sighed his relief. “Nothing that can’t wait until Monday. It’s good you’re not in town.”

“What happened? Tell me.”

“Uh, I got my tires slashed, and someone broke into my trailer. Totally tossed the place. They didn’t get much because I’ve been sleeping at my parents’ house, but it definitely seemed like they were looking for something.”

“Did you call the police?”

“No, I’m pretty sure I know who it was. Don’t worry. I’m working on it. I did manage to connect that guy Preston to Becky, so it looks like we’ve got a straight case of revenge here.”

“Becky? You mean,
Gabby’s
mother Becky?”

“Yeah, she’s a real special case. Are you alone?”

“Yes.”

“Hey, you want to stay where you are and I’ll come there? I don’t know how much information Becky and Preston have access to. I mean, I’m easy to find. So is Nikki. I just don’t feel comfortable with you being there alone. They probably wouldn’t physically hurt you, but they might try to break in to see what they could grab that’s related to the business.”

“There’s nothing like that here. It’s just a beach house. I left all my work at home. I don’t even have a computer here. I’ll be
fine
. There’s an alarm system and…”
Why am I dissuading him? I want to see him.
She clamped her lips.

“Trinity, don’t argue with me on this, okay? Either I come, or I’ll send Juan to drag you back in his minivan.”

Trinity cringed. She’d smelled the inside of that thing. Sour milk came to mind. “Jerry, I think you’re overreacting. I’m
fine
here, but if it makes you feel better…”

“Look, I care about you, so yes, it makes me feel better. I’ll be there in a few hours. Waiting on one more tire.”

He cares about me? What does that even mean?

She shrugged it off.

At first, she was fine. She’d showered, dressed, and made herself a sandwich for lunch. That comprised the first hour of her wait. The second hour, she tried watching one of those “How did they make that?” shows on an educational channel, but she kept jumping every time someone down the street slammed a car door. During the third hour, she was damn near frantic. It was barely three o’clock when she resorted to yanking the blender out of the pantry and dumping about half a bottle of tequila into some frozen daiquiri mix. She’d only managed to swallow one serving when a knock shook the door. She almost pissed herself.

She approached the door warily, and pulled back the curtain to see Jerry’s pale blond ponytail, and his back to her as he scanned the street. She opened the door and beckoned him in.

He walked across the threshold, tossed a black nylon duffel bag onto the wooden rocker, and left his sandy flip-flops on the mat.

“What’s in the bag?” She retreated to the counter to refill her drink. His arrival hadn’t quelled her nerves. If anything, it reminded her of why he was there in the first place. “Ammunition, maybe? Tasers?”

“No, pixie, a change of clothes and some underwear. And my computer, of course.”

He walked around the house proprietarily, checking window latches, and returned with a blank look on his face. He was serious.

“Why the clothes? Going swimming?”

“No, if you’re spending the night here, so am I.” He didn’t look like he gave a shit if she minded.

“Well, Aunt Ginger might find it to be a bit improper…if she ever found out, that is.” Ginger wouldn’t give a hot damn, and Trinity knew it.

“Oh, well, it’s a good thing this is all very chaste. I’ll be right there on that sofa.” He hooked a thumb toward the convertible hunk of furniture in question.

Trinity cringed. God, that thing was uncomfortable. She’d slept on it a couple of times when they’d brought guests to the beach. She probably would have been equally comfortable sleeping on a park bench.

“You don’t have to do that. You can sleep in my bed and I’ll sleep in Aunt Ginger’s.”

He shrugged. “So, are you going to offer me a drink? Maybe something that’s not cloyingly sweet and fruity.”

“Yeah, yeah.” We’ve got beer, wine, lemon-lime soda, and water.”

“Water’s fine, pixie.”

She handed him the bottle, and he stood there for a moment massaging the cap beneath his palm, and staring at her with a smirk.

That damned blush again. She’d probably pass out soon if she kept it up. There was only so much blood to go around. She grabbed her giant daiquiri cup and slipped around him, the hem of her flowing skirt curling around his leg as she passed. She felt absolutely humiliated—like some girl in the locker room on the first day of gym class who didn’t develop over the summer like the rest of her peers. It was silly and she knew it. He’d seen her
naked
, for fuck’s sake, and at the time he seemed to like it. Now she was fully dressed, yet felt far more exposed.

Get a grip on yourself, girl. It’s just Jerry
.

Right. Just Jerry.

She curled up into one end of the sofa and turned the volume on the television up. She didn’t even know what the show was. She just stared and sipped. Stared and sipped. After a while, she heard the sound of a zipper being unfastened. Her eyes went wide and things low down in her body clenched. She held her breath thinking,
He doesn’t beat around the bush, huh?

Then Jerry appeared in her periphery with his laptop.

She turned her head to watch the fully-dressed gentleman lower himself into the cushion at the far end. “I want to show you something,” he said, waiting for his operating system to boot up. “Found this in my inbox this morning. Nikki was so stoked. Nothing better than free publicity.”

Trinity put her drink on the coffee table and leaned over the middle cushion to look. “What is it?”