Page 130 of Happily Ever After

Into The Devilhouse

Flicka von Hannover

I still think there’s something he’s not telling me.

Flicka and Dieter opted for a “stay-cation” at their rented house in the Apache Tears Ranch development rather than a honeymoon. They’d both had enough of planes, automobiles, and sprinting across Monaco to last them for a while. Sleeping in their own bed sounded like the mostexotic adventure they could think of.

However, on Saturday night, Dieter told Flicka they were going out for supper and dancing, and she wouldn’t need a purse. Flicka managed to pull herself together, even though staying in again sounded better.

As they were getting ready to leave, Flicka thought that maybe Dieter was underdressed in black, dress slacks and a black tee shirt, or maybe she wasoverdressed in a silvery, silk sheath that had become a little too tight over her new, baby-related boobs. When Dieter looked at her, his gaze scorched her right through her dress, and he pressed her back against a wall for a hot, deep kiss before he broke it off and went to his car.

When they arrived at the nightclub in the cool, desert night, floodlights lit the exterior of the white building,which sort of looked like an Americanized Georgian manor house with high windows and complicated trim work, except for the palm trees.

“What is this place?” Flicka asked.

Dieter handed his keys to a burly valet as they walked in. “Just a nightclub I know of. The food is good. There’s dancing. And other things.”

“You didn’t get a claim check or anything for your keys,” she pointed out.

Dietersmirked. “They know me.”

In the vestibule, the light crowd walked toward the sound of the thumping music and darkness beyond the open arches.

They followed until they were just inside, but Dieter pulled her toward a staircase and told her, “We have a table reserved on the upper balcony.”

“Oh, fancy.”

Flicka followed him up an iron, circular staircase, past a burly guard. Dieter just noddedto the guard, a tall, muscular black guy who nodded back.

Other people had to show the guy something on a phone screen to get past, probably a reservation number, but Dieter just nodded to the guy?Weird.“Do you know him?”

“That’s Gregory.”

“So, you know him.”

“Sure.”

At their table, Dieter flipped open his menu.

Flicka asked, “Are we dancing afterward?”

“Some dancing, sure. But thereare other attractions here.”

“Like what?”

“You’ll see.”

“I think I’ll have the fish,” she said.

“Try the potatoes with it. They’re really good.”

“Oh, sure. Maybe someday.” Reality dawned on her. “Oh, I can!I can eat carbs.”

Dieter laughed. “I think I’ll keep you pregnant all the time, just so that you can enjoy potatoes without guilt.”

While they ate, Flicka surveyed the wide balconieswhere they and other diners sat, eating and watching the nightclub down below.

On one end, a dais was set up with, Flicka surmised, an actual throne. It looked a bit more like a Hollywood set designer’s idea of King Arthur’s medieval throne than most real thrones, many of which are from the Georgian or French Louis Quatorze eras, not the Middle Ages. A tiny blond woman perched on the throne andsurveyed the nightclub while she talked with the crowd of people who sat around her, laughing and drinking.