What the Lady Wants (7 page)

"What's wrong with you?" he asked her when they were in the car.

"Stormy."

"No kidding." Mitch put the key in the ignition. "That woman is strange. What's her IQ, twelve?"

"I think she was upset," Mae said nobly, trying to defend Stormy without feeling cheered that Mitch wasn't impressed with her.

"That whole setup is strange," Mitch went on. "Why would he buy her another place when they had that one?"

Mae frowned in agreement. "That's not the only thing that's strange. Could you explain to me why a man would cheat on a mistress as beautiful as Stormy?"

"Sure." Mitch started the car and pulled out onto the road. "He's a guy."

Mae felt the anger that she'd been nursing for Armand's insensitivity veer toward Mitch. "There are a lot of men who don't cheat on their lovers."

"No, there aren't."

Mae glared at him. "Is this based on personal or professional experience?''

Mitch looked over at her condescendingly. "Don't get huffy because you don't like the facts. I'll admit I see a lot of it because I get hired to look for it, but the fact is, men cheat. We have to. It's a biological imperative."

"An imperative," Mae repeated. "This would be testosterone we're talking about here, right?"

"Well, that's part of it. But a lot of it is just man's need to see what's beyond the next hill. It's the reason men crossed the oceans, built the pipeline, opened the West." Mitch waved his hand, obviously feeling expansive. Iron Mitch.

"So you're saying my Uncle Armand cheated on Stormy because he couldn't open the West?"

Mitch looked over at her warily. "I don't suppose we could let this drop."

Mae set her jaw. "No, I don't suppose so."

"I don't know why women always get so upset over this." Mitch shook his head. "This is just the way men are. It isn't in our nature to commit."

"And why is that?" Mae asked between clenched teeth.

Mitch turned onto the street that led into Mae's high-rent district. "All right, let's say I'm married." He shot a stern warning glance at Mae. "Of course, I'm never going to get married because I don't believe in it and there are still a lot of librarians out there that I haven't kissed, but for the sake of argument, let's say I'm married."

Mae settled into her seat, her jaw still clenched. "This should be good."

"And let's say my wife is beautiful, intelligent, exciting, with terrific legs and the world's most perfect breasts. I mean, perfect breasts. High. Round. Smooth." He took one hand off the wheel and cupped it in the air. "Firm. The kind that bounce but don't shimmy, if you know what I mean."

Mae raised her eyebrows. "Been thinking about this a lot, have you?"

"No. I never think about women's breasts. Where was I?"

"Bounce, no shimmy."

"Right. So I'm married to the perfect woman with perfect breasts, but then I see another woman. On a street corner, maybe."

Mae frowned at a woman in a blue dress on the corner. She was leaning into the wind, unnecessarily, in Mae's opinion, and the dress molded itself around her curves. "On a street corner."

"Right. And she has a nice figure, nothing like my wife's, of course, and her legs aren't as good, and she's just attractive not beautiful."

"And the point is?"

Mitch shrugged. "I want to see her breasts."

"Why?" Mae said. "I thought you just said your wife—"

"Yes, but I've seen those. I want to see these."

"Even though they're not as good."

"Well, yeah, but they're still good."

Mae thought for a moment. "Suppose she turns out to be a
Playboy
centerfold. If you buy the magazine, will that do it?"

"No."

"Suppose she's a stripper, and you get to see them for real. Will that do it?"

"No."

"But you're seeing them," Mae said, exasperated.

"I'm seeing them, but all I did was pay money to see them from a distance. I need to personally—"

"Open the West." Mae glared at him. "You are disgusting."

"No, I'm not," Mitch protested. "I'm not married, and I never will be, and I have never promised a woman I wouldn't see other women. I am free to open the West anytime I want."

"You're still disgusting."

"Look, there's no point in getting upset about this. You can't understand because you're a woman, and women don't think like that."

"Women don't want to open the West?"

"No. Women want to stay home and keep the East looking nice."

Mae took a deep breath as a red mist rose before her eyes. "You're deliberately trying to make me kill you, aren't you?"

"No." Mitch's voice was the Voice of Reason. "This is just biology. Men need multiple breasts in their lives. Women need to make a commitment to one penis."

"That is garbage," Mae said flatly.

"Then why do women always want to get married? Because they want to commit to a penis."

"Then why do men get married?"

"For backup. That way, they always have a set of breasts at home."

Mae picked up her purse, using every ounce of self-control to keep herself from hitting him with it. "Stop the car, I'm getting out."

Mitch blinked at her in alarm. "Why?"

"There's a man on the corner back there, and I think his penis is bigger than yours."

Mitch scowled at her. "Don't take this out on me. This isn't about me. We're talking about
other
guys here. I'm not married. I don't cheat. And anyway, you've never seen my penis, so how do you know his was bigger?"

"Well, I can't be sure, of course. But I want to
find out.
I feel this need to
explore,
to
lay pipeline,
to
open the West."
Mae craned her head to look behind her. "Turn around. I'm pretty sure we can find him."

"You don't want to open the West," Mitch dismissed her. "You just think you do because of women's liberation."

"Long." Mae lingered on the word. "Thick. Hard. Throbbing. Bobs not droops. I can see it now. Take me back. I want him."

"You are no lady." Mitch turned down the road to Mae's house. "Besides, a good detective never gets distracted on the job. We're working. Pay attention."

"Whoa." Mae turned her head to watch a man on a motorcycle go past. "Look at that one. Hello, Daddy, come to Mama." Mitch pulled into the driveway, and she opened her car door before he was completely stopped. "If anybody asks, tell them I went West."

"Very funny." Mitch caught the skirt of her dress as she got out and yanked her back into her seat against him, and she tried to ignore the heat his hand generated against the small of her back. It was such a little thing, but it made her throat close and her breath come shallow, and when she turned to look at him, he was staring at her with a funny look on his face. He pulled his hand away and cleared his throat and said, "Are you going to help me find out what happened to your uncle or not?"

"I suppose so. Duty calls." Then she remembered what they'd been arguing about. "And after all, there'll be another man along any minute. And it's okay because
I'm not married."
She beamed at him and slid out of the car before he could catch her this time.

"This is not an attractive side of you," Mitch called after her. She ignored him, but she heard him sigh, and then he followed her into the house.

June wasn't home, so they foraged for food on their own.

Mitch stared at the mounds of food inside the refrigerator: plastic-wrapped trays of cold cuts and vegetables, tiny chilled petits fours, gallon jugs of punch. Bob joined him, and they surveyed the feast with equally wistful eyes. "You have enough food here for an army."

Mae came to stand beside him, distracting him from the food.

She was distracting him a lot lately.

"That's all for the memorial tomorrow." Mae pushed past him to rummage on a lower shelf. "How do you feel about leftover lasagna?"

"Enthusiastic." Mitch told himself not to watch her as she bent over farther to get the lasagna, but he did, anyway. He was human. And so was she, thank God.

He wondered how long it would take for her to get over her snit about opening the West. Probably days.

She pulled the lasagna from the fridge and nudged the door shut with her hip as he backed out of the way. Then he watched as she put the lasagna on the counter and stretched to take down two plates from the cabinet, nudging Bob away from the counter with her foot. Her dress was loose, but it pulled against the muscles in her arms and back and flowed over her rump, and he sighed just from looking at her.

He'd never met a more watchable woman in his life.

That was odd, when he thought about it. He'd known a lot of very attractive women, many of them more attractive than Mae Belle Sullivan. All right, not many, but some. Stormy Klosterman, for one. So why was he watching her more and more and thinking about the case less and less and Stormy not at all? This was a bad sign in more ways than one.

A smart man would tell her he was investigating the rest of the case on his own.

Mae slid lasagna-filled plates into the microwave, tapped in the time, punched the power button and turned back to him. "So where are we going this afternoon?"

Mitch said the first thing that came to mind. "I want to meet Barbara Ross, the woman who convinced Armand to leave Stormy."

"I thought he did that because he had to open the West."

"Well, sometimes you get a trail guide to take you, so to speak."

Mae laughed and Mitch grinned back.

"Does this mean I'm forgiven?"

"For what? That drivel in the car?" Mae shook her head. "Well, you're a macho jerk, of course, but at least you're an honest macho jerk. You didn't try to convince me that you had to go West for my own good, or that deep down inside, women
want
men to go West. You're up front about being a jerk. That's kind of nice."

"I object to the jerk, but if it gets me off the hook, I'll take it."

"It gets you off the hook." The microwave dinged, and Mae turned to pull the lasagna out.

Good. Now she was happy again, and he could leave her at home and get to work.

"And you're not fooling me with this sudden need to see Barbara," she added. "You just want to meet more women." She put the lasagna on the table and distracted him by smiling at him.

Suddenly, leaving her behind held no appeal. "With you there as a chaperon? Hardly. What else are we having besides lasagna?"

"Bread." Mae went into the pantry to get it, and Mitch watched her move.

Okay, so he'd tell her tomorrow he was working alone. After the memorial service.

A bird chirped outside, and Bob swung his head into the cabinet with a resounding thunk.

"I know just how you feel," Mitch told him and went to see what Mae was doing in the pantry.

Mitch swung the Mercedes into a parking space. "Birds of a feather."

Mae got out and stared up at the building, wilting in the heat. "I'd rather die than live here."

"Fortunately, you don't have to make that choice." Mitch came up behind her. She didn't move, so he put his hand on the small of her back to push her toward the door, enjoying the warm dampness there. When he realized how much he was enjoying it, he jerked his hand away. "No one will ever make you live in an overpriced condo."

"Somebody tried to once." Mae walked toward the door.

"Who?"

"My ex-husband."

Mitch stopped. "You were married?"

Mae looked back over her shoulder. "It didn't last long. Four years."

Mitch scowled, annoyed for some reason. "Four years is long. You lived with some guy for four years?"

"Four years is not long for a marriage. Marriage is supposed to be forever. And no, he didn't open the West, if that's your next question." Mae pushed through the lobby doors.

"I wasn't going to ask." Mitch followed her into the air-conditioned opulence, upset, wondering why he was upset. So she'd been married. Big deal. It was none of his business. "So what happened?"

"It didn't work out."

"Because you didn't like living in a condo?" What kind of a fool had this guy been? If she wanted to live in a tent, Mitch would have... He stopped himself. No, he wouldn't have. He was never getting married. But if he did get married, and it was to someone like Mae, he'd live in a tent if that was what it took to keep her. "You left because you didn't like the living arrangements?"

Mae rang for the elevator. "I didn't leave. He did."

"What a fool," Mitch said, and Mae smiled at him.

"Thank you. That's very sweet of you."

Mitch shrugged. "Just an observation. Nothing personal."

The elevator stopped, and Mae put her hand on his arm. "There's just one thing I want you to know."

Mitch tried to look understanding and supportive. "Yes?"

"If Barbara cries, it's your turn to pat."

"No way in hell," Mitch said and held the elevator doors open so she could pass through.

The maid was dark, thin and irritated at being bothered. Obviously, this was a job for someone with charm, so Mitch stood back to let Mae operate.

"We've come to see Ms. Ross." Mae smiled at her. "Please tell her Mae Sullivan is here."

"She's not here. She's still in Barbados. She'll be back tomorrow."

The maid started to close the door, and Mitch stuck his foot in it. So much for charm. "When tomorrow?"

The maid glared down at his foot. "In the morning."

Mae met Mitch's eyes. "Maybe she doesn't know about Armand." She turned back to the maid. "Do you know if she's planning on attending the memorial service for Armand Lewis tomorrow?"

"Of course she's planning on going." The maid stared at Mae as if she thought Mae was insane. "She's the widow, isn't she?"

"She is?" Mae's mouth dropped open. "The widow? Are you sure?"

"Sure I'm sure." The maid moved her head from Mae to Mitch. "Now, if you don't mind, I have things to do."

Mitch moved his foot, and she slammed the door in his face.

"She's the widow? They're married?" Mae slumped against the wall. "He married her?"

Mitch put his hands in his pockets and watched her deal with the blow. "When would he have had time to marry her?"

"Last week, I guess. He was out of town all last week, but he came back on Friday to be with Stormy, and he spent Saturday and Sunday at the house with us. He was on the phone most of the time, but he was with us. And he went from us to Stormy on Monday night, and then he died."

"And he never mentioned getting married. That is something he would have mentioned, right?"

"Well, you'd think so." Mae swallowed. "It must have been that week he was gone." She looked up at Mitch. "If he did get married, what would that do to the will?"

"I don't know." Mitch frowned. "It might invalidate it. She'd get something under Ohio law."

Mae pushed herself away from the wall and turned back to the elevator. "Come on."

Mitch trailed after her. "Where are we going now?''

"Uncle Claud," Mae called back. "If it's about money, Uncle Claud has the answer."