Page 68 of Killer Body

Maybe he’d gotten sidetracked on the phone. He seemed to be doing more and more of that, calling his old friends and lovers at all times of the day and night.

Bobby W sat in the upstairs office, his back to the door, facing the window.

“Hey.” Lucas knocked softly on the open door. “You okay?” Then he saw the bourbon bottle sitting on the glass desk, catching the light.

Bobby W turned, his eyes blurred with alcohol and tears. He held out his phone, fingers trembling. “She called me.”

“Who called you? Rochelle?”

He shook his head and stared down at the phone as if it were a person, or the ghost of one. “Jules.”

EIGHTEEN

Rochelle

At least Jesse hadn’t killed them on the freeway. He dropped her off in the driveway, leaning over the seat when she got out.

“Get something to eat,” he said. “I’ll grab a sandwich on the way to the office.”

She walked slowly inside, glad the nightmare of the last two days was behind her. Not much mail, mostly bills, but there would be an e-mail from Megan. Her baby never missed a day.

She entered through the front door, trying to keep the bills from slipping off the catalog. Damn. Jesse had forgotten to set the burglar alarm before they left for Santa Barbara.

She dumped the mail on the white-tiled bar and stopped for a moment to look at the large framed poster beside the black refrigerator. Admit it, she had looked pretty good; no wonder the poster was a collectors’ item now. If you had a Charlie’s Angels and you had a Rochelle McArthur, you had two of the most important looks in the past two decades.

She’d like a cigarette, but she hated to smoke in this home she loved as if it were a living thing. No, just resist the urge. Go through the mail, first this stuff, and then the computer.

A creamy envelope slid out of a Victoria’s Secret catalog. An invitation to something? She tore open the envelope and reached inside. What the hell? A card of some kind. She pulled it out, staring into Julie Larimore’s enigmatic smile. She turned it over. On the left side was the printed slogan:You’ve Got to Wantthe Body.To the right, where the address should be, someone had printed in large capital letters, “Don’t try it.”

She dropped the card. What a cheap shot, a prank. Was this amateur threat really supposed to scare her off? The prankster didn’t know who she was dealing with, and it was ashe,of course, someone petty, like Tania Marie. Still, she felt violated to receive something like this in her own home, her sanctuary.

She picked it up again, thinking she’d have to talk to Jesse. Maybe they could turn this around to get her back on Bobbo’s good side, point the finger back at Tania Marie. Only she would stoop to something this childish.

As she started to put it back in the envelope, she realized something else was in there. She turned the envelope upside down, and two pieces fell out. It looked like a photograph, torn from a magazine.

Holding them side by side, Rochelle felt a tremor. It was a photo. A photo of Megan.

Rochelle clutched the phone and leaned against the kitchen sink, looking through the window at the vine-covered fence, tiny yellow flowers trailing along the wood. It all looked so safe, but it wasn’t. She wasn’t.

Megan answered on the first ring.

“Are you all right?”

“Of course. What’s the matter, Mom? Your voice. You’re not still smoking, are you?”

“Listen, baby, because this is really important.” She felt as if someone were strangling her, as if she were speaking through a crushed windpipe. “I want you to come home, right now.”

“What’s wrong? Is it Dad?” Always Daddy’s little girl. He was her first concern.

“We’re okay, honest,” she said. “I just want you with me at home.”

An audible sigh, and then Megan’s voice returned to normal. “I’m in the middle of finals, Mom. I can’t give you that four-point average if I drop the ball now. Has something gone wrong with your Killer Body gig?”

Still pressing the phone to her ear, Rochelle reached out to close the blinds. “Yes, something has, and I want you home, finals or not.”

Rikki

When I hear Lucas close the upstairs door, I know I’m in trouble, and I’m ready for any excuse as to why Bobby Warren won’t be joining us.