the darkness, didn’t get there until close to midnight.
She said, “I wish it was like this all the time.”
“What you mean?”
“Just me and you.”
“That would be cool.”
“I want to divorce him.”
“Why don’t you?”
She clasped and unclasped her hands, told me that her husband had her in an airtight prenuptial agreement. She walked and the fairy tale ended, she’d have to give up everything except her socks and drawers. All she would be entitled to was what she came in the front door with. Wouldn’t even get to keep her half of their season tickets to the Lakers. Compared to what she had now, what she brought to the table was a sack of crumbs.
I looked around at her world. Sat on the edge of her pool and looked at a tropical paradise filled with guesthouses, steam rooms, swimming pools, and maids that showed up three times a week to dust and cook and clean and pick up every crumb that was left on the floor.
We moved the party to the back of the grounds. I followed Lisa’s naked sashay, water raining from her skin, and we stepped into a Jacuzzi big enough for fifteen people. Waterfalls were all I could hear. Warm water all I could feel. Lisa went underwater, took me in her mouth. I touched her hair while she made love to me, touched her hair and gazed up at the waterfalls, at the enclosed yard, then at the house, through glazed-over eyes I stared at that castle.
She came back up smiling.
I nodded. “Yeah. Would be hard to give this up.”
“The only way I’d get to keep this, to keep all of this and have you...”
I paused. Waited for her to finish wiping water from her face and give me her words.
She said, “I keep hoping that his fucking plane will crash on the way to Vegas or back. Double indemnity would kick in and the post-man wouldn’t even have to ring my bell.”
I didn’t say anything. Her tone told me how serious she was. That shit was disturbing.
Point blank, she asked, “Ever killed anybody?”
I swallowed, took a hard breath. “Beat a few motherfuckers down.”
“How bad?”
“Sent a few busters to the hospital.”
“You hurt a lot of people when you were in jail?”
“Didn’t fight as much on lockdown, not after that first couple of fights got me respect. That’s about it.”
“Never killed?”
I skipped my answer. “What about you?”
“Shot a couple of gangbangers.” She said that like it was no big deal. “That was in my rookie year. One came at me with a butcher knife. The other wouldn’t put down his weapon.”
“That’s self-defense.”
“Hell yeah. I was scared as fuck. You have no idea how scared I was. It’s one of our basic instincts. Self-preservation kicks in and you do what you have to do to survive.”
I thought about self-preservation. Doing what I had to do to survive.
I asked, “You go out on stress?”
“Yeah. I did.”
“Therapy?”
“For what? I just wanted to take some time off and chill. I went to Europe.”
My eyes went to hers. There was coldness in her eyes. Like someone who had been shoved around too much, too long. She created an instant smile and that coldness turned warm.
She said, “Twenty thousand. How does that sound? Like a fair price?”
“You serious?”
“This could work. Like strangers on a train, we have no connection. No e-mails. No faxes. When you come by here, you come at night and leave while it’s still dark.”
“Yeah, I’m your phantom fuck. Your backdoor lover. I don’t exist.”
“Not to anybody but me. Hardly a phone call between us. You don’t come on the days that the maid comes. Nobody sees you. They’re too busy nurturing their own indiscretions.”
I went silent. Looked around at her paradise. Asked myself if I’d kill to have it.
She said, “You could do a lot with twenty thousand. It would be tax-free money, so that’s the equivalent of thirty large.”
“Not like I’d notify the IRS.”
“What would you do if you had that much money? I’m talking cash money.”
For a man like me, twenty thousand was a million dollars.
I said, “Sit on it until hard times got softer.”
Momma needed some financial relief. She had been up and down since Reverend Daddy died. Living off public assistance. Rufus, he wasn’t doing well, wasn’t really working, living off Pasquale, taking experimental drugs. That money could help a lot with a few of his bills.
“Could be a good start.”
“Yeah. Could be.”
“Or better yet, you could stack your chips. Try and buy a house.”