I was unloading the truck when BeBe pulled into the lane behind the carriage house.
“Park in Caroline’s spot,” I said defiantly. “It’s not like she’s gonna need it.”
“Won’t that piss Tal off?”
“Fuck him,” I said, glaring in the direction of the townhouse.
“Ooh, intrigue,” she said. “Tell.”
“First, help me get the rest of this stuff in the house.”
When we’d unloaded, and I’d finally washed all the cobwebs and grime from my hair and body, I put on clean clothes and went downstairs. BeBe had gin and tonics waiting. Dogs are great, but very few of them will fix you a drink.
“You’re smiling,” she said. “So last night couldn’t have been all that bad.”
“Last night was a disaster,” I said. “But I hit a good sale today, and I think maybe I can raise enough money to buy the Moses Weed cupboard.”
She made a face. “Not that again.”
“Yes, that again.” I told her the story of the toolshed and the T. Eugene White painting. “I should clear a couple thousand, at least.”
“Money is good,” BeBe said solemnly. “But sex is better. What happened last night?”
I took a long hit of gin and tonic. It was icy and cleared my sinuses. Yum.
“It’s the damnedest thing,” I said. “Here I’ve been living like a nun the past year, and last night, I had not one but two men trying to put the moves on me.”
“Daniel?”
“And Tal,” I said grimly.
“Give me the good stuff first,” she begged. “How did it go with Daniel?”
“All right.”
“Weezie!” she yelled. “Don’t play coy with me. Did you do the deed?”
I tried to look indignant. “Do I look that easy to you?”
She sighed. “Tell me you at least fooled around a little.”
“Define fooling around.”
She scrunched up her face and gave it her best consideration.
“Let’s see. Tongue.”
“Check,” I said.
“Horizontal position.”
“Check.”
“Clothes removal.”
I frowned. “Sort of.”
“Whose?”
“Mine.”
“Define ‘sort of,’ ” she said.
“He was in the process. But my belt got kind of tangled. And then Jethro started barking, and it was Tal at the door, and Daniel peeled off in his truck.”
“God.” She giggled. “Just like in high school. Your boyfriend peeled off.”
“Your high school maybe, not mine. And I would hardly call Daniel my boyfriend.”
“You almost let him undress you,” BeBe said. “If he’s not your boyfriend, what is he?”
“Point taken.”
“Back to Tal. What did he want?”
“He wanted me to share his pain,” I said. “Asshole.”
“What did he say to make you so mad?” BeBe asked. “Just the other night you were ready to rush over there and soothe his fevered brow. I thought you were thinking about a reconciliation.”
“Never,” I said. “Talmadge Evans is a contemptible, low-life, subhuman sack of crap.”
“I could have told you that,” BeBe said. “But what the hell did he do?”
“For one thing, he ate my dessert. I was planning on having that for breakfast.”
“I thought you were planning on having Daniel for breakfast.”
“Not just yet. But after last night, I will admit, there are possibilities there.”
“Get a room next time,” she advised.
“There may not be a next time. He looked pretty mad.”
“He’ll get over it. They always do. But let’s get back to Tal.”
“Oh yeah. He had the nerve to tell me that even though Caroline was prettier than me, and smarter than me, he’d come to the conclusion that it was me he loved—not her.”
“Nice,” she drawled.
“I haven’t told you the absolute worst yet,” I said. I’d been trying not to think about it since I’d thrown Tal out the night before, but it was like a canker sore, one you can’t quit poking at. It hurt to think about, but I couldn’t let it go.
“Caroline wasn’t the first time,” I said. “He’d cheated on me before. Three years ago. Some chick in Atlanta.”
BeBe got up and took my glass and fixed me another drink.
“Men are such shits,” she said.
“The worst of it is, right up until the moment he spilled his guts about that, I had this sort of secret deep-down feeling that maybe it could work out again. Is that sick or what?”
BeBe squeezed her lemon into her drink.
“Sweetie,” she said. “Listen to me. I’ve been married three times, divorced three times. You may not want to believe this right now, but here’s the sad news: You and Tal aren’t done yet. Divorce is like a virus. You think you’re over the shithead, then a couple months later, wham! You’re flat on your back again, and you’re not wearing your panties. It’s called a stealth fuck. I wouldn’t want this to get around, but yeah, I slept with all my ex-husbands after the divorce. It’s kind of kinky, you know? Especially the feeling that you’re making him cheat on the other woman—with his ex-wife.”
“No way,” I said flatly. “Even the thought of kissing him makes my flesh crawl. And don’t forget—in my case the other woman is dead. And everybody thinks I killed her. That’s past kinky. That’s macabre.”
BeBe raised her hands, palm out. “I’m just saying. OK? Don’t be shocked if it happens. And think about this: how pissed off would Mother Evans be if she found out her baby boy went crawling back to bad old Weezie’s bed?”
I laughed. “She’d probably castrate him with a dull butter knife.”
“Hold that thought. It’s gotta be a turn-on. But just remember, that’s all this is gonna be. A little meaningless but therapeutic sex. And do me a favor, will you? Make him beg for it. I never did like Tal.”
“Not gonna happen,” I repeated.
I rooted around in the refrigerator and found a container of pimento cheese spread I’d made earlier in the week. There were some Waverly crackers too. “Hey, Babe,” I said, spreading some cheese on a cracker. “You really slept with all of them? Even Howie?”
Howie was the ex-husband she caught ordering ladies’ lingerie for his girlfriend off the Internet, and charging it to her American Express card.
“Especially Howie,” she said firmly. “And afterward I made sure I left a pair of my panties in the glove box of his truck. Something to remember me by.”