“One is a cake,” Scarlet said. “The other is pastries. Suzanne said you looked like you needed them.”
“It’s true,” Rosemarie said. “You are looking a little peaky. And you’ve got dark circles under your eyes.”
“Thanks,” I said, taking the box of pastries over to the settee. “I’m so glad I used ridiculously expensive concealer to not cover them up.”
“You must be having a girl,” Rosemarie said. “They get jealous and zap all the beauty right out of you.”
“So I’ve been told,” I said, selecting a bourbon sugar ball from the box and popping it in my mouth.
I was feeling pretty raw regarding her comment on the dark circles under my eyes. Had I woken up at my best? No. But I’d done my best to ignore the morning sickness and put on a bright and cheerful face on a gloomy day.
With Nick back to work and me feeling sorry for myself, I’d known an attitude adjustment was in order. I just didn’t understand why I was so sad. The weather made me sad, Nick getting to go to work made me sad, my dark circles made me sad, and the fact that there was a hole in my favorite underwear made me sad.
So I’d tried to brighten my day by wearing my black leggings and topping them with a yellow-and-black plaid skirt with pleats. I’d put on a matching yellow turtleneck and a black fuzzy vest. I thought it had been cheerful, but Aunt Scarlet had told me I looked like a bumblebee. I was a bumblebee with bags under her eyes.
I popped another bourbon sugar ball into my mouth and sniffed a little, trying to keep the tears at bay. I didn’t feel quite so sad with the rush of sugar flowing through my veins.
I looked up to see both Scarlet and Rosemarie staring at me.
“What?” I asked.
“We’ve been talking to you for ten minutes,” Rosemarie said. “You haven’t heard a word we’ve said.”
“If it’s about the circles under my eyes or how I look like a bumblebee, then I don’t want to hear it. I don’t need that kind of negativity in my life.”
“You’ve been in the doldrums ever since you kissed that hunk you married goodbye this morning,” Scarlet said.
“How’d you see that?” I said. “I thought you were sleeping.”
“I told you, I’ve got eyes in the back of my head.”
“Wait, why did you kiss Nick goodbye?” Rosemarie asked, confused. “I thought he was retiring from police work so he could run for his grandfather’s senate seat.”
“He is,” I said. “But his grandfather’s seat doesn’t come open for another two years. Nick said he’ll stay with the police department until the baby comes, and then he’ll spend the next year or so campaigning for the seat.”
I hoped Rosemarie didn’t ask me how I felt about potentially being a senator’s wife. I honestly had no idea. I mean, being a cop’s wife was no walk in the park. I’d learned staying busy was key so you didn’t constantly think about the million ways your husband could die. Plus, I figured the dangers of the job were probably a lot lower and the life expectancy was a lot higher for senators.
As far as the whole senator thing went, I was being supportive, but I couldn’t really see myself in the role of senator’s wife. I was presentable enough if the occasion called for it, and I knew which fork to eat with, but I was one of those people who could stick my foot in my mouth at any given moment. And if something embarrassing was going to happen to someone, chances are it was going to happen to me. Murphy’s Law and I were well acquainted.
Scarlet pulled a fork out of her fur coat, and sat down on the settee opposite me. She opened the cake box and dug in.
“What’s the matter with you?” Scarlet asked, licking icing off her lips. “And don’t give me any crap about the baby. Women shoot out babies every day. Is it the hormones? I’ve heard they can make you crazy. I knew a woman who found out she was pregnant and ended up feeding her husband rat poison and then shaving her own head.”
“That sounds like a bigger problem than hormones to me,” I said. “Nick isn’t in danger. I just feel out of sorts. Like I’m in someone else’s body.”
“I think your boobs are from someone else’s body,” Scarlet said. “They’re huge.”
“I kind of like that part,” I said, looking down my shirt. “It’s hard to explain. I’ve married the man of my dreams. We live in a nice house, and we have anything we could want, plus a baby on the way. But I’m…bored. Maybe that’s not the right word.”
“I don’t think you’re supposed to say you’re bored until at least a year of marriage,” Rosemarie said. “At least that’s how it worked for me. But I’m probably not the gold standard when it comes to such things.”
“I don’t know,” Scarlet said. “I’ve been married a bunch of times, and I got bored of a couple of them real quick. But I was never very good at picking husbands. I had a penchant for bad boys. And sometimes bad boys aren’t the good kind of bad. Sometimes they’re just bad.”
“Isn’t that the truth,” Rosemarie said. “I learned the hard way that marriage isn’t for everyone. And it’s especially not for people who can’t keep their peckers out of the whores down on River Oaks Road. Roger gave them so much money he had to send out 1099s at the end of the year.”
“Any person who sticks anything into a whore on River Oaks Road needs a shot of penicillin and an exorcism,” Scarlet said. “But you’re right about one thing, they don’t make bad money.”
Rosemarie sighed. “I wish you had been my mother,” she said to Scarlet. “I needed that kind of wisdom in my youth.”
Rosemarie was working like a maniac while we were talking, comparing swatches of lace and pairing them with place settings and centerpieces.
She finished what she was doing and then came over to look inside my pastry box. I might have growled at her, but I decided to be polite. “Do you want that cinnamon twist?” I asked.
“I don’t think so,” she said. “I saw you lick the sugar off the outside five minutes ago.”
Oh, yeah. I’d forgotten. “I’m eating for two,” I said, picking up the cinnamon twist to finish it off.
“You’re eating for thirty-two. That was a big box of pastries.”
“I’ve got low blood sugar, and I’ve been a little down lately,” I said. “Besides, it’s Suzanne’s fault. She gave me all the leftovers from the front case. She would’ve thrown them out anyway. That’s just wasteful.”
“That’s true,” Rosemarie said. “Waste not, want not is what I always say. Sometimes I’ll go in just before closing and see if she’s got any sample cakes she didn’t use for tastings. Then I’ll go home, sit naked on my couch, watch the Bachelor, and eat cake. If that doesn’t make you feel American, I don’t know what does.”
“God bless America,” I said.
Chapter Three
The front door opened and the cold and drizzle rushed in. A whirlwind of color moved into the room, and a coat of crimson swung around legs almost as long as my whole body. Her lips and nails were painted the same scarlet as the coat. Suzanne could stop a crowd no matter where she went.