Katharine’s kitchen was trashed. Empty Diet Coke cans littered the stylish black-and-white tiled floor. The Sara Lee had lasted only five minutes into Mary Bliss’s detailed accounting of her disastrous financial situation. Katharine had pulled out a box of Gino’s frozen mini-pizzas, a bag of ranch-style Doritos, and a jar of peach salsa. The salsa made her thirsty, so Katharine whipped up a batch of banana daquiris in the blender. She ate and drank while Mary Bliss talked. The awfuller the story got, the hungrier and thirstier Katharine got.
Once the diuretics kicked in, Mary Bliss talked and cried and peed and kept drinking all of Katharine’s expensive bottled water, but she wouldn’t eat a thing.
By noon, they were both nauseous and exhausted.
After a while, they moved into the den, where they lolled on the matching sofas facing Charlie Weidman’s big-screen TV, which was tuned to Oprah, but with the sound turned down.
“You’re really broke?” Katharine asked again. “And you’re sure he’s really gone?”
Mary Bliss nodded. “That’s why I was so late. I called the branch manager at the bank to have them double-check the computers. I called the mortgage company too, and the ‘customer courtesy’ line kept me on hold for forty-five minutes. When the girl finally got on the line it took her about a minute to tell me that Parker hasn’t paid the house note since February. Then I called Libby. You know, Parker’s assistant. She was as shocked as I was.”
For the first time that morning, Mary Bliss cracked an honest-to-God smile.
“At least I know he didn’t run off with Libby. I was always sort of secretly jealous of her, if you want to know the truth. Parker used to talk about what a terrific-looking neck she had. Like Audrey Hep-burn’s. And she wore the cutest clothes. You know, Ann Taylor, that kind of thing.
“Anyway, the office phone had been disconnected. I called her at home. Libby was as hysterical as I was. When she got in to the office this morning, the building manager was having the janitor haul their files and stuff into storage. They wouldn’t let her in. Said Parker was three months in arrears. And Libby’s paycheck bounced. Her bank said Parker’s business account was closed on Friday.”
“What about your stocks and bonds and stuff?” Katharine asked.
“Not good,” Mary Bliss said. “I called our stockbroker. He was surprised to hear from me. Parker told him I had malignant bone cancer and that’s why he was liquidating our accounts. Because the insurance company wouldn’t pay for the bone marrow transplant, because it’s considered experimental.”
“The son of a bitch,” Katharine shouted. “Parker Son-of-a-Bitchin’ McGowan. No offense, M. B., but I never would have thought he had the balls for something like this. I mean, to give you bone marrow cancer. Jeez. That is cold.”
“I know,” Mary Bliss said, sniffing. “This from a man whose idea of a walk on the wild side was ordering chocolate jimmies on his fat-free frozen yogurt.”
Katharine drummed her long nails on the top of the cocktail table. Mary Bliss gave her a look, and Katharine put her hands in her lap.
“He’s cleaned out checking and savings, sold your stocks, and the house could go into foreclosure at any time. Credit cards?”
“Maxed out.”
“Your car?”
“Paid off,” Mary Bliss said. “Of course, the book value on a ninety-eight minivan with eighty thousand miles on it isn’t much.”
“At least you’ve got your wheels,” Katharine said grimly. “What about insurance?”
Mary Bliss sighed. “I’ve got health insurance coverage for me and Erin through the school system. And there’s my life insurance policy through school too. Parker always said it cost too much to have us on his company plan. Although, he had Eula on the plan, of course. As vice president of the company. Cute, huh?”
“He’s a pig,” Katharine said.
“It’s just semantics now,” Mary Bliss said. “The company’s kaput. Anyway, his note said Eula was taken care of. So that’s something, I guess.”
“Don’t teachers get paid all summer, even though school’s out?”
“Oh yeah,” Mary Bliss said. “My paycheck might just cover this month’s light bill.”
“The weasel. The fucking weasel. What did you tell Erin?”
“Just that he was out of town on business. She thinks he’s in Dallas.”
“Any idea where he might really be?”
“The Lexus is gone. And he ordered two suitcases and some sport shirts from Land’s End. You know Parker, he hasn’t bought his own clothes since we got engaged. I checked with the mail-order people. He had the stuff delivered to his office. That’s about all the detecting I was up to this morning.”
An uneasy silence fell over the den. On the big-screen TV, Oprah was hugging a small, squirming wheelchair-bound child. Katharine’s finger-drumming stepped up. She cleared her throat.
“Another woman?”
“I don’t know,” Mary Bliss said. “It was the first thing I thought of. A man like Parker, he’s used to being taken care of. First Eula took care of him, then me, then Libby. Just at the office, though. But who? Who else could he have been carrying on with?”
She gave Katharine a searching look.
“You’d have told me if you knew something, wouldn’t you?”
Katharine looked hurt. “Are you kidding? Didn’t I just tell you about the water-retention thing? Wasn’t I the one who let you in on the fact that your ankles are just the teeniest bit beefy for capri pants? M. B., if I’d even suspected what the prick was up to, I would have been all over him like white on rice. But he was too damn sneaky. I didn’t have a clue. And I’ll tell you what. If anybody would have known, it would be me. I sense things. You know that.”
And Mary Bliss did. Katharine had an amazing ability to look at a man and know what kind of low-down behavior he was indulging in. Even with Charlie, she’d suspected months and months before she’d found the first shred of evidence.
Now they were both drumming their fingertips.
“You want my lawyer’s phone number?” Katharine asked, breaking the silence.
“For what?”
“For the divorce, fool.”
Mary Bliss lifted her chin, steely-eyed. She felt calm for the first time that morning. “No divorce,” she said. “I want him dead.”
Katharine patted her hand. “I know, shug. For what he’s done to you, and to Erin, and to women everywhere, I want him dead too. I want Parker McGowan hurt. I want him stoned and stripped, and dragged naked through the streets of Fair Oaks. And we can do that. My lawyer is the most vicious, ruthless woman you have ever met in your life. She even scares me. She will put an ass-kicking on Parker that he will never forget.”
“It’s not enough,” Mary Bliss said quietly. “Dead won’t even be enough.”
Katharine nodded again. She had felt this same way, the first time she’d seen Charlie get in that woman’s car outside his office. She’d even had a handgun, a little .22 that she’d bought after a couple of break-ins in Fair Oaks, in the car that day. It was right there in her Prada handbag. She’d gotten the pistol, clenched it in her fist, thought seriously about shooting Charlie, and his little slut, right then and there.
But she hadn’t been fast enough. And anyway, she’d never actually learned how to fire the thing. But the will, the intent, was there. After she’d found her lawyer, Gina Aldehoff, Gina told her lots of her clients wanted to kill their ex.
“But there’s no future in homicide,” Gina told her. “Divorce is better. No stains. Trust me, it’ll be just like that country music song.”
Katharine didn’t listen to country music, and she was shocked that her Harvard-educated lawyer did.
“What song is that?”
“I’ll get you the CD,” Gina said, grinning. “It’s called, ‘She Got the Goldmine, I Got the Shaft.’ ”