The Wedding Party (16 page)

“Since I got a cleaning lady,” he said. Charlene picked up an apple. “I have beer and Jack Daniel's.”

“No Château Ste. Michelle Chardonnay?”

“Not hardly.”

She rubbed the apple on her skirt, shining it up, and bit into it. He poured himself two fingers of Jack, neat.

“I'll have one of those,” she said. He gave her a look, his eyebrow raised. “Long day,” she said. “Long month.”

“Your funeral,” he obliged doubtfully.

“So, when did you decide to have a clean house?”

“Don't start pushing my buttons, Charlene. I've had a long day, too.”

“I'm not trying to push your buttons,” she said, chewing the apple. He handed her a drink. She handed it back. “Could I have a little ice and water?”

“Sure. Wimp.”

“I'm genuinely curious. What happened?”

“Nothing
happened.
There's a list of people about four miles long who need a second chance, a little work, a break. So, I have this girl who cleans the
house and washes the clothes once a week, and I have this kid who does the yard. What's the big deal?”

“Oh, no big deal. It's just that I never knew you to notice anything was messy. The Jake I know would be glad to help someone with work, if he had any work to be done, but he'd never imagine that he—”

“See, now
that
was a button,” he said, interrupting her.

“Jake, I thought the girl…Meredith…I thought she was someone you were dating.”

He laughed at that, threw down his Jack and poured himself another. “Get serious.” He pulled out a kitchen chair and sat in it wearily. He was looking a little worn. Tired. He gave her a lopsided smile and shook his head. “Does she look like my type? She's about Stephanie's age.”

“Men never seem to be bothered by those silly age things. They date and marry girls younger than their daughters all the time.” She sipped. “And you've had many types.”

He scrunched his eyes up and peered at her through slits. “Button?”

She took another big bite of apple, put it on the table, stood up and shrugged off her suit jacket. She sat back down and sipped her drink. “Tell me how you got started in this little rehabilitation program of yours?”

“I don't know,” he said, stretching. “Accidentally.”

“Come on,” she said. “Hardly anything is an accident with you.”

“Well, I didn't start it up, if that's what you mean. It was a fluke. Remember that old joke? Guy is sitting
in a bar and a hooker walks up to him and says, ‘I'll do anything you want me to do for a hundred bucks, but you have to tell me what you want in three words or less.' And he says, ‘Paint my house.”' She laughed at him. No surprise. He had always made her laugh. “That's about how I got started in this program. There was this hooker, just a young thing. Jesus, she was a kid. Anyway, she wanted to get away from her pimp, but she couldn't support herself. And even if she'd tried, he'd have found her and knocked her around again, put her back on the street. So, I rounded up six guys who needed their houses cleaned.”

“Young? How old is young?” she asked.

“Oh, Charlie, you don't want to know. We were taking a big chance here. This kid was not legal. The ‘right' thing would have been Social Services, but y'know…” He rubbed a hand through his hair again. The long day was showing on him—five o'clock shadow, rumpled clothes. But once he started talking about this project of his, a spark lit behind his eyes. A fire. “I just didn't think the system could keep her safe.”

“You thought you could keep her safe
better
than the system.”

“Okay, so don't hold that against me. We did, when it was said and done. We had work for her, cleaning, then we had to find a place for her to stay. One of the married guys offered to take her in, give her a bed in the basement rec room. His wife taught school and it was summer break and she was a toughie. If she could manage the thugs she had in the classroom, we figured she could manage Nicole if she gave them any trouble.
But Nicole didn't give them any trouble. Man, she wanted
out.
”

“What about the girl's parents?”

He gave a huff of laughter. “You know
that
story.” He rubbed the rim of his now-empty glass with a fingertip. “I'm a father, Charlie. You think I'd take on this little pro if I thought there was any chance she had decent parents who would protect her? It was pretty obvious her situation at home put her on the streets. And I put my job on the line. So did the other guys.”

“So…it started with her?”

“Sort of. The thing is, word leaked out, like it always does. And we found out that there was a bunch of people getting themselves way too involved with these second-chancers. There were a couple of women cops who were giving shelter to battered women, moving them in and out of their houses like they were running bed-and-breakfasts. We had the homeless living in garages, doing odd jobs. We even had a kid washing dishes and busing tables, living in the back of Coppers.” He gave his head a sharp nod and smiled crookedly. “It's been working out real well.”

“Sam says you're organized.”

“In a way. We got an accountant, just to keep us out of trouble. Every once in a blue moon we'll throw a picnic or dance, and put the money in the pot.”

She watched his face while he described what was completely selfless charity work, but with no ego. If he was proud, it was of the program; he wasn't boastful.

“Jake,” she said, smiling, shaking her head.

“What?”

She laughed at him. “I so frequently think about why I divorced you that I hardly ever remember why I married you in the first place.”

“Yeah?” He puffed up. “I thought you said it was the length of my—”

She hit his hand, shutting him up, but she laughed. “Believe me, it wasn't that.” She grew more serious, wistful. “I sometimes forget how inherently
good
you are.”

“Yeah, baby,” he joked.

She touched his hand. “You shouldn't listen to me when I say you're a bad role model. I'm glad you're Stephie's dad.”

“Don't get goopy, Charlie. I'm just an average guy doing a below-average job.”

“No. You're way above average, going the extra mile.” She drained her glass and put it on the table. “I have to go. I'm absolutely exhausted.”

“You sure? I could order a pizza.”

“No thanks,” she said, standing. She picked up her suit jacket to put it on and she wobbled a little.

“Whoa there,” he said, standing. “That drink go straight to your head?”

“It wasn't the drink. I think I stood up too fast.”

He held her jacket for her to put on. “I don't know, Charlie. I don't know if I want you driving just yet. Maybe I should take you home.”

“Ha! You've had twice as much to drink.” She put an arm through a sleeve.

“Yeah, but I'm better at it.” He turned for her to put in the other arm.

“So you'd like to think. You—”

Both arms in, she found herself facing him, standing almost unbearably close. He was grasping the front of her jacket. Neither of them moved. In her heels, she was almost his height, and she could feel his breath on her face. Slowly, so slowly she was barely aware of it, his hand let go of one of her lapels and rose, a bit awkwardly, to her face. He lay his palm against her cheek; his hand was rough and calloused. His fingers, fanned, reached into her hair. She closed her eyes and turned her face into his hand, kissing the palm.

“Aw, Charlie,” he said, his voice raspy. “You're gonna hate yourself…”

She lifted her lips from his palm and looked deeply into his eyes; his, moist and green and steamy as jungle grass, and hers, hot as fire.

His arm circled her waist and he devoured her mouth. She met him with her own and opened her lips under his, a taste coming to her that she recognized, that she knew well, that she remembered and on occasion longed for.

Jake's hands immediately moved from her waist to her rib cage and up, moving over her underarms to the front of her shoulders and over the top, slipping her jacket off, down her arms. She let it drop to the floor. Her hands came together behind his head and she pulled him harder against her lips while she kicked off her pumps. With one arm around her waist, Jake moved the other under her legs and lifted her into his
arms just as her second shoe fell. And he carried her to bed, where they tore at each other's clothing, throwing it every which way.

It was perfectly choreographed, smooth as a ballet, from touch to kiss to lift to the gentle tumble onto the bed.

This had happened before. And not just twenty-five years ago.

It was complicated, but then, when was it not? Charlene had great passion for Jake. She always had—at least since their third date. There were issues and emotions upon which they were as melded as soul mates. When it came to police work, law, right versus wrong, the underdog, Charlene and Jake could stand side by side and provide a united front against injustice. Also in the area of sex. Their bodies fit together as if they were made for that purpose alone. Since their very first coupling, each had known instinctively how to please the other—what to touch, how much pressure to bear, whether to hold back or forge ahead.

They also knew when to speak and when to shut up. In bed, at least.

The moment they were naked, skin against hot skin, they came together like long-starved lovers. He was inside of her in seconds and she was ready for him in less time. He held himself above her and she pulled him into her. With her legs wrapped around him, they rocked together, erupting into a mutual orgasm that left them shuddering and panting. It was as though neither of them had been sexually satisfied in so long they were like overripe plums that fell from the same
tree at the same time and exploded on impact with the ground.

Then they collapsed into grateful relief. Jake rolled over, next to her, and drew her close with one arm while he reached down to the foot of the bed with the other, and pulled the quilt over them.

“We didn't even make it under the bedspread,” she whispered.

“That happens sometimes,” he said. And, beneath the quilt, he gently caressed her. Patiently and softly. Because he knew, when they recovered a little, they would do it again, but this time slowly. Carefully. Taking their leisure of each other.

But, most of all, not talking about it.

“It” was the difficult and complicated relationship they had shared for over twenty-five years. Though Charlie had passion for Jake, undeniable passion, she couldn't stand being married to him. Couldn't live with his mess, his childishness and high energy, his short fuse. He didn't ever turn his short fuse on her, but it detonated all around her. Something on the job would work him up and he would slam around for hours, maybe days. It was impossible. He called himself “flexible,” but the truth was, he couldn't stick to a plan. He was almost never on time, was easily distracted and forgot important things, like meeting her at the hospital when she was about to give birth. And he took too many risks, personally and professionally. He was just a big, dumb kid in a man's body. He spit, went to boxing matches and never read books. Of any kind.

As for Jake, he was in love with Charlie and always had been. Desperately, passionately, hopelessly. But he couldn't please her, except when he hunted down criminals or made love to her. In those two things she could find no fault. But she was rigid and had been set in her ways since she was twenty. She had this thing with being perfect—if she said dinner at six, she didn't mean 6:03. From the day he met her she had had her life mapped out, exactly the way everything was going to happen for her, from college to law school to interning to her practice. She even had the date she was going to pass the bar written in her diary. Jake knew he wanted to be a cop, but beyond that he wasn't sure of anything.

Stephanie. Now, there was something she hadn't planned on. But then, neither had he. Despite the fact that Charlene and Jake couldn't get along for five minutes, they'd done all right with Stephanie. It seemed there was one thing that gave them the impetus to compromise…and they both loved her more than life.

He touched her breast and kissed her neck. “I'm getting too old for this, Charlie.”

“Oh? You could've fooled me.”

He raised himself up on an elbow and looked down at her. “Y'know, this has happened to us from time to time, and we kind of go along with it because—”

“Shh,” she implored.

“No, this time I have to say something here. This is the first time either one of us let this happen when we were in a…you know…committed relationship.”

“Please, Jake, can we talk about this later?”

He kissed her below the ear. “If you promise. I have to talk about it this time.”