Sex on Tuesdays (16 page)

“Well done, Henry!” Simon patted the excited Henry on the shoulder and proceeded to line him up for his next throw.

Warmth stole through me and I smiled as I watched Simon joke around with the guys for the next half-hour. And when the team won the match by default, due to a player from the opposing team wandering off halfway through the match, he offered to buy everyone a round of drinks. This was a side of Simon I hadn't seen before. And I liked it.

“What about you, Dani?” he asked sending a grin in my direction. “Feel like a beer?”

“Nah. But I could murder an orange juice.”

“Okay, six beers and an orange juice coming up,” he said. “And who's for potato chips?”

I watched six paper-thin hands wave in the air.

While the men gathered around the table to drink their beer, dissect the game and analyze every winning throw, my mother smiled and beckoned me to follow her as she walked across to the dart board to gather the darts together.

“Okay, I admit Tug can get a wee bit overzealous at times,” she said when I caught up to her, “but that's because he finds me irresistible.
All
the men at Sunny Days flirt with me. They think I'm fun to be around.” She paused, and I watched her smile trickle away. “You know, Dani, I can't believe how much I missed out on all those years I was married to your killjoy of a father. All those years I was so intent on keeping up appearances. And even after he died, God rest his soul, I was still so freakin' uptight it's a wonder I didn't bore myself to tears.”

I didn't butt in, just wrinkled my nose in agreement.

“So why the heck didn't you tell me what a stuffed shirt I was?”

Luckily, Mum didn't wait for me to answer. Probably because she knew that back then she wouldn't have listened to me. More than likely would have refused to talk to me for a week, for being presumptuous.

“Now, for the first time in my life I'm really alive,” she went on, eyes lighting up as she spoke. “Since I've been here, I've realized that life is a gift. And when you wake up each morning, you've gotta grab that gift with both hands and run with it until it's time to quit.”

“Wow, Mum, that's very profound.”

“So,” she said, giving me a sly wink. “I've decided to spend my twilight years in a blaze of promiscuity. Which means that I'm going to get as much nooky as Henry and his Viagra can handle.”

Holy crap!
“Umm…”

“But I'm digressing,” she went on as though we'd been discussing a day at the zoo instead of the Big Three—life, death and nooky. “I don't know what our uptight Ms. Reeding is so fired up about—probably not getting any herself. But Henry knows I wouldn't cheat on him. And Tug's okay with that. He's a nice lad. In fact, if I was a few years younger I might even ditch Henry for him.” She waggled her eyebrows. “Or take them both on in bed.”

“Muuum!”

Somehow, somewhere…someone had swapped my old-fashioned mother for a sex-crazed alien!

“Oh, Dani, stop being such a prude and lighten up,” the sex-crazed alien said. “Sex is fun. I don't know why you don't grab Simon by the chest hairs and drag him into your bed. He's a good-looking stud and you're missing out on all that fabulous testosterone.”

“Mum!” I snapped and jerked a quick glance across at Simon to see if he'd heard her ridiculous suggestion. Luckily, he was listening to Mavis, the feisty Centenarian of Sunny Days Retirement Home, who was likely telling him how she'd lived to a hundred by smoking, fornicating and eating lots of chocolate. “Simon and I are just friends,” I told my mother. “Once you bring sex into the equation it can ruin a perfectly good friendship.”

“It doesn't have to, sweetie,” said Mum, giving me a quick hug. “Sex and friendship are the two top ingredients in a relationship. One's no good without the other. I just didn't know that until recently.”

“But Simon doesn't think of me in that way,” I protested. “I've always been Penny's little sister to him.”

“Poppycock! Every time the man eyeballs you he thinks of you ‘in that way.' In fact, I could
still
end up as Simon's mother-in-law.” When I shook my head at her she added, “Hey, you could do a lot worse. You've been a worry to me over the years you know. It's way past time you were married to a good man who'll love you and take care of you. If I were you I'd—”

“Can we get back to Tug? And the fact that Ms. Reeding—”

“Who is an idiot…?”

“Right,” I said, realizing the topic was closed. “So shall we rejoin the dart players? That glass of orange juice looks good to me.”

“And so does that gorgeous hunk you brought along with you. If I was you, Danielle, I wouldn't wait for
him
to make a move, I'd jump his bones and play whoopee the moment I got him alone. Remember what I said before. Life's a gift. So tear off the wrapping, girl, and enjoy the hard throbbing centre.”

As I said before, somehow, somewhere…someone had swapped my stuffed-shirt mother for a sex-crazed alien.

But strangely enough, I wasn't fussed about getting my original mother back.

17

Thursday, 5:45 p.m.

Half an hour later, as I drove along the Main North Road towards Gawler, Simon, sitting in the passenger seat beside me, flipped his mobile phone closed and stowed it in his pocket.

“Been a new development,” he said turning to me. “We can't search Jack's house tonight.”

I almost smiled—at the last minute turning the smile into a frown. “Oh, dear,” I mumbled. “Bad luck.”

“That was my contact at
Gape
on the phone. He tells me Jack Rivers will be at home tonight. He also said a couple of club owners, both with suspected drug connections, arrived from interstate this morning. Our boy Jack has evidently offered them big money for a one-on-one interview in the privacy of his home.” He paused. “And there's also talk of a ground-breaking scoop.”

“Yeah, but at whose expense? Some poor shmuck will be taken to the cleaners tomorrow morning when their shame is printed across the front page of
Gape
.”

“That's a given,” agreed Simon. “And as for Mary's murder, unfortunately, even though my gut instinct puts Jack Rivers seriously in the frame, I have no evidence. Not even a connection between them. Shame we have to postpone breaking into Jack's house tonight.”

Oh yes, a real shame, I thought as
my
gut instinct screamed:
Don't break into Jack's house any time! Not tonight! Not tomorrow! Not at all!

“We'll do it in the morning, while he's at work?”

My proverbial feet grew colder. “What if someone sees us?” I bleated. “We could end up in jail.”

“Dani, darlin', don't sweat it. We'll be dressed as AGL meter readers. No one will give us a second glance. Anyway, I've found most people these days look the other way. They don't want to get involved.”

Simon's logic didn't really comfort me. I'd always been one of those people who didn't want to get involved. Although, since Mary's killer had no qualms about involving
me
in his dastardly plans, it was time I hauled my head out of the sand and confronted the truth. Okay, so far I'd followed clues, interviewed the owners of The Fish Inn and even prodded Derek into spilling the beans—but breaking and entering—hell, that was something else again.

That was illegal.

My fingers tightened on the steering wheel while my stomach did a back flip. “Okay, I guess I'm with you,” I agreed. “If you're sure that's the only option.”

“Do you honestly believe I'd break the law unless it
was
the only way to find out if Jack's the murderer?”

I flicked a quizzical glance across at him and raised my eyebrows. “You can pick a lock?”

He grinned, his teeth flashing white. “Maximum twenty-five seconds.”

“Right,” I said and straightened my shoulders and squared my jaw. If Simon was willing to risk going to jail for me, the least I could do was provide back-up. “What time and where shall we rendezvous?”

“You've been watching too many crime shows, Ms. Summers,” he answered smiling.

God, I loved the way his whole face lit up when he smiled. “And you've been reading too many crime reports, ex-Detective Templar.”

When had I taken an interest in the way Simon smiled? He'd been smiling at me for over thirty years. And why was my heart beating so fast?

“Okay, you win,” he said with a chuckle. “But we'll leave the details of our rendezvous until the morning. To be on the safe side, I'd better give my contact another ring. Confirm the perp's movements.”

“Perp?”

“Police-speak.” His face lit up in another grin. “And talking of perpetrators—hasn't your mother changed? Old Gwen's a real go-getter since selling up and shifting into Sunny Days.”

“Don't I know it!”

We'd left the gang at Sunny Days scuttling off to the dining room for their evening meal. Probably Oysters Kilpatrick with sticky date pudding for dessert. As soon as the gong had sounded, Henry—head down, bony shoulders hunched, walking-frame in top gear—had led the charge, the other residents hot on his trail.

As I swung into Murray Street, Gawler, the traffic lights changed to red so I slowed down and eased to a stop. “You know, I've never seen my mother look so happy.”

“Nor so sexy and alive,” he added leaning back in his seat as two teenage boys—both with iPods glued to their ears—crossed the road, their lanky adolescent legs pumping in time to the music. “Um…Dani,” Simon suddenly blurted, sounding like a high-school kid himself. “Wanna watch a Road Runner DVD with me, tonight?”

I blinked. Road Runner DVD? The cartoon where Wile E. Coyote accidentally blows himself up at least ten times, yet still continues to chase the fast-moving, beep-beeping, road-running ostrich?

“It's a classic,” he persisted, and for a split second a splinter of insecurity pierced his usual tough guy, I'm-alright-mate, shield.

And then Mum's profound words: “Life's a gift” popped into my head and I nodded. “Sure,” I told him. “I'd love to.”

“How about I get to your house around 7:30 and bring a family-size pizza with the lot?”

“Great. I'll provide the wine and the popcorn.”

“Don't bother dressing up,” he said—meaning he would be wearing his baggy trackpants and his favorite out-of-shape jumper. “We can just lounge around. Have a laugh.”

Have a laugh? While watching the devious coyote set up a TNT roadblock for the ostrich before blowing himself to smithereens? Right. And then the rest of Mum's profound words imprinted themselves upon my brain: “Life's a gift. So tear off the wrapping and enjoy the hard throbbing centre.”

The thought of Simon's hard throbbing centre had the blood rushing from my head to the pit of my stomach. And lower.

Did I really want to tear off Simon's wrapping?

You bet.

* * *

By the time I dropped Simon off at the
Tribute,
called into a bottle shop for a carton of my favorite Fox Creek Red Baron Shiraz, and hit the supermarket for a couple of those micro popcorn bags that swell up and pop once they're introduced to a microwave oven, it was gone six thirty. Still confused re my new feelings for Simon, but content to see where the night led, I parked the car in the garage and struggled up the path towards my front door—wine, tote bag, coat and popcorn bags spilling from my arms.

“Hi there little fellows,” I said to a family of magpies, who, along with half a dozen seagulls and two doves, flew down from the roof to greet me. “G'day, Tonto. Feeling hungry?” I smiled at my favorite feathered visitor, a tame grey dove with white feathers cresting its head. Tonto was always the first to greet me in the mornings when I stepped outside the front door to pick up the paper, and the last to pay his respects when I sprinkled breadcrumbs on the lawn at night. “Let me get this shopping inside and I'll see what I can find for you to eat.”

A cardboard box about the size of a shoebox sat on my front step. I hadn't won any items from eBay recently and there was no writing on the package—or stamps—so it hadn't come in the post. Maybe those feral kids from number 60 were playing a practical joke on me, filled the box with stones—or something more unsavory—and dumped it on my doorstep. Probably watching and giggling from the top branches of the tree in their garden right now.

With no hands free to check the box out, I fumbled my key into the keyhole and when I bumped the front door open with my hip, Horace greeted me, eyes alight with anticipation, a drool-covered tennis ball gripped between his jaws.

“Sorry, sweetie,” I apologized, tumbling coat, tote bag and popcorn onto the kitchen table and sidestepping my tail-wagging dog to store the wine in the refrigerator. “No time for us to play ball tonight. Simon's due in forty-five minutes and I have to make myself beautiful.”

Horace tipped his head to one side and blinked.

“Okay, I know, impossible. However, there's a hot shower and shampoo and a bag of make-up on my dressing table that's calling me.” I closed the fridge door and felt my heart lift at the thought of not being alone tonight. Of having a laugh with Simon. Thing is, I wasn't imagining him laughing—in my head, I was picturing him naked.

Smiling at the thought of a naked Simon, I brought the mysterious box in from the front step and set it on the kitchen table, hung my coat on the back of the door and stored the popcorn in the food cupboard.

When had I started to think of Simon as more than a good friend? The night he rescued me from outside Edward's house? Or before that, when he brought me home from Erika's, put me to bed and took care of me? Or was it when I saw him in a different environment at Sunny Days, interacting with the elderly residents?

My mind still on Simon, I tore the lid off the box and peered inside. A loaf of pumpkin bread? Yuk. I hated pumpkins. It was a vegetable only fit to be fed to pigs. I couldn't work out how people could enjoy eating pumpkin pie or worse still—pumpkin ice cream. Hell, the next
in-thing
would be broccoli cupcakes. Or parsnip pudding. Or what about corn-on-the-cob chewing gum?

None of my friends would make me a loaf of pumpkin bread. So where did it come from? Unless it was the woman across the road—the one who only moved into our street last week. Yolande someone-or-other. She'd called out to me yesterday when I waved as I hurried past on the way to the shops—and I'm sure she said something about having purchased a new bread-maker. That must be it. She'd made a batch of fresh loaves and dropped one off for me. Very sweet of her. Okay, I'd make sure I knocked on her door and thanked her for the bread, and then hint that out of all the varieties of bread in the world, my all-time favorite was honey-oat.

After I'd fed the pumpkin loaf to the birds….

One eye on the clock, I grabbed the still-warm loaf and hurried out onto the front lawn. The moment I appeared, the birds surrounded me. Fighting, squawking, hassling each other to get closer. Demanding I get the hell on with it.

“Okay, calm down. No need to get your wings in a flap. There's plenty for everyone.”

With a satisfied smile, I watched each bird grab their own personal chunk of bread, shake it until the bread broke into even smaller pieces and then, protecting their meal with aggressive body language, proceed to scoff every crumb.

I glanced at my watch. No time to dash across the road and thank Yolande for the bread now. I'd make it a priority first thing in the morning. There was still Horace to feed and let out in the back yard for a run, and the house to tidy before I could turn myself into a bargain-basement version of Cameron Diaz for tonight's date with Simon, Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner. They might be happy to wear their sloppy, lounging-around clothes—I wasn't.

Half-hour later, freshly showered, hair blown and dried until it sat snugly around my ears in a sleek bob, face pampered and painted, I stood in the bedroom in my black lacy bra and knickers, surrounded by piles of discarded clothes. What to wear? Would Simon take one look at me and bolt in a commitment-phobic cloud of dust if it seemed like I'd tried too hard? Especially as he'd be in his old trackpants and beloved out-of-shape sweater. This wasn't a date—as such—we were merely spending a couple of hours together watching cartoons. And when did watching cartoons ever turn into a romantic interlude?

Maybe tonight
, I reasoned, as with a wistful smile I slid silky black slacks up my legs and hunted in the bottom of my wardrobe for that new, creamy, low slung pullover I bought at Target last month.

* * *

A knock on the dot of seven thirty had me patting a last dab of vanilla perfume behind both ears before hurrying to open the front door.

“Dani?”

My first thought was how great Simon looked. He was wearing an olive-colored cashmere jumper that I hadn't seen before over a smart pair of khaki Dockers. I smiled. He'd thought enough of our date to ditch his out-of-shape jumper and trackies.

My second thought was why was he cradling a dead bird?

“Simon? What's going on?”

“You tell me. Your lawn is covered with dead and dying birds.”

“Nooooo!”

It took me a full ten seconds to comprehend the sight that greeted me after I'd pushed past Simon in my hurry to get outside. My friends—my birds—once bright and spilling over with life, lay on their sides, blood trickling from open beaks, wings fluttering weakly—or absolutely still, already dead.

“The bread…” I gasped.

I heard Simon come up behind me. “What bread? What's going on, Dani?” His voice sounded thin and scared.

“The…the pumpkin bread,” I stammered, bending to scoop up Tonto, the dove with the white top feathers. The dove that spent most of his day perched on my TV antenna on the roof and
hoo-hooed
to me the moment I arrived home. “Nooo…not my little Tonto,” I whispered through a throat choked with tears.

“Dani?” Simon clasped my shoulders and gently turned me to face him. “What bread are you talking about? And what does it have to do with these birds dying?”

“There was a box on my front door step when I got home.”

“Jesus!” Simon's eyes widened. “And you opened it?”

I nodded. “There was a loaf of bread inside the box. Pumpkin bread.” I gazed down into the lifeless eyes of the little grey dove in my hand and felt the lump in my throat tighten. “Oh, Simon, what have I done?”

“You? You've done nothing, Dani.”

“But I killed them. Don't you see…I killed them all.” Fighting tears, I lay Tonto on the grass next to his still-twitching mate. It didn't matter that I'd seen many dead birds over the years. Nor how mature and world-wise I'd become. Nothing eased the pain of guilt. “Simon,” I croaked, shaking my head. “I detest pumpkin bread so I fed it to the birds. And I killed them.”

“Dani, darlin',” Simon groaned and draped one arm around me. “That bread was meant for you.” And then he pulled me against the soft down of his new cashmere sweater. I snuggled deeper in an attempt to control the shaking that threatened to take over my limbs while his large hands rubbed my back and slid up and down my arms. “Can't you see…some murdering asshole left that bread for you to eat? Instead of dead birds, it could have been you writhing on the floor in agony right now. Whoever did this monstrous thing expected you to be found by a neighbor, cold and stiff as a chunk of ice tomorrow morning. They didn't know I was coming.”