An Ex to Grind (39 page)

"Dan," I said. "Could you focus for a second and fill me in?"

The question caused him to pivot and glower at me. "
I
should fill
you
in?"

"You're very upset," I said. "Why don't you sit down and I'll make you some coffee."

He pointed his finger at me, jabbed it in my direction. "You stay right where you are,
darlin'
."

His tone was sarcastic, mocking, toxic. I couldn't imagine what might have set him off. "Fine," I said. "Why don't we both sit down?" I sat on the sofa and patted the cushion next to me.

"Why don't you stop trying to control me?" he said. "If I wanna stand, I'll stand."

Uh-oh. "Then stand," I said. "Just tell me why you're upset, okay?"

"You already know."

"No, I don't. As a matter of fact, you've been AWOL since Monday. I would have thought you'd call and tell me what happened. How did Leah react to everything?"

"Leah." More mirthless laughter. "She claims she really loves me."

"I'm sure she does," I said. "But you and I have the kind of long-term—"

"She even pretended she wasn't in on it."

"In on what?"

He cupped his hands around his mouth and whispered, "The big plot."

The big plot. What the hell was he talking about? "I'm trying to follow you, Dan, but maybe you're just tired. Why don't you stretch out on the bed and take a quick nap? How does that sound?"

"Like something you would say. Jeez, do I hate you."

I felt as if he'd just kicked
me
in the stomach. "Hate me?"

"Hey, skip the amnesia, okay? You set me up. You wanted out of the alimony so much that you hired Leah to play my girlfriend. I know the whole sick story. You're so busted, baby."

Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God. I couldn't breathe, and my heart dropped down to my feet. He knew. Or at least he sort of knew. But how? Who told him? Oh, God. Oh, God, Oh, God.

If he finds out what you did, don't duck it
. That's what Evan had made me promise. But I couldn't lose Dan. Not when we'd only just rediscovered each other.

"Say it, damn it," he shouted, startling Buster enough to trigger a bark. "You conned me. You and Leah both conned me. I've gotta be the dumbest sonofabitch that ever walked the face of the earth."

If he finds out what you did, don't duck it
. I wanted to be heroic. Really, I did. But I couldn't coax the truth out of my mouth.

"I didn't con anyone," I said. "Whatever you think you know must be some silly misunderstanding."

He stormed over to me and stabbed another finger at me. "Leah already admitted it! When I told her what I heard, she admitted that the matchmaker put her together with me in Central Park the day she and I met. Naturally, she denied knowing anything about your part in it. You women take care of each other, I guess. Does she get a cut of the money you're gonna save on the alimony now that she lived with me for ninety days? Is that how it works?"

So he thought Leah and I were in cahoots? No wonder he was as furious at her as he was at me.

"How could you pay someone to trick me out of what was legally mine?" he said, shaking his head, as bewildered as he was enraged. "And how could you fuck around with my emotions like that? You said you loved me. What a joke! What a goddamn joke!"

If he finds out what you did, don't duck it
. The words kept reverberating in my brain.
If your relationship can withstand the truth, maybe it's stronger than I thought
. All right, Evan. You made me promise and I did promise, so here goes.

"It's not what you think, Dan," I began.

"Oh, please," he snapped. "That's what every liar says."

"I meant that it's
worse
than you think. I didn't just con you. I conned Leah too."

"Like I believe that," he scoffed. "If you're gonna confess, then confess."

"Well, believe this: I love you. I'll tell you everything—the whole horrible truth—but whatever you may think of me at the end, don't you dare think I was conning you about my feelings."

"You don't have feelings, Melanie. I finally get that."

The tears started to come then, but I flicked them away. I had to stay strong, had to recount the story without breaking down, had to make him understand why I'd done what I'd done and how I'd do anything to atone for it.

And so I told him how angry I'd been about getting stuck with the spousal support and how his lavish spending had infuriated me all the more.

"You didn't make a secret of that, honey bunch," he taunted.

"I know," I conceded. "But Robin Baylor reminded me that we had a ninety-day cohabitation provision in our settlement. She explained that if you lived with a woman for that period of time, the spousal support would terminate automatically."

"I bet you were licking your lips when you heard that."

"I was. But you kept saying how you weren't interested in committing to another woman, so I forgot about it."

"What was it that changed your mind? A dip in the bond market? A bad day on the Dow? Or was it just too weird to have to turn your money over to a
man
?"

"Maybe all of the above. I don't know," I said. "But you didn't help the situation by chartering private planes and buying expensive clothes and drinking the finest champagne—and rubbing it all in my face."

"I've already said I was sorry about that. We're talking about what
you
did."

"Right. I'm just trying to put it in context."

"Fuck the context and tell me about this matchmaker."

"Okay, okay. She was the one who introduced Weezie and Nards. They suggested that I talk to her about setting you up with someone."

"Nice. And I thought they liked me."

"They did. But you lost a lot of goodwill the way you were acting, Dan. I wasn't the only one who was pissed off at you."

He didn't say anything, so I kept going.

"I went to see this matchmaker and looked through the files of her clients and, to make a long story short, I picked Leah to meet you in Central Park that day." Why complicate things by telling him about Jelly and Rochelle?

"The idea being that she would be so pretty and sweet that I wouldn't be able to resist her?"

"Yes. But she wasn't in on the plan. All she knew was that there was this newly divorced ex-football player who was too proud to hire a matchmaker, so she wasn't supposed to say anything to you about it."

"Then she did lie to me."

"Only about why she was in the park that day. She had no idea that I was behind the plan or that I wanted out of the alimony or any of it."

He narrowed his eyes. "So what you're saying is that she's only a little less of a schemer than you are."

"She's not a schemer." I gulped back another threat of tears. "She's just a woman who loves you."

"Bullshit." He waved me off. "When did you two decide to fight over me? I mean, you set me up with her and then all of a sudden you wanted me to break it off with her. Was that a little twist in the plan? Does she get a bigger piece of the action for bowing out?"

"Of course not. When you started to change, when Leah's love started to change you, I couldn't help noticing. You went from being this guy who hid from life to a man who embraced it. You stopped showing up late when it was your turn to bring Buster over. You went on job interviews instead of hanging out in strip clubs. You got hired as a college coach, the very thing you swore you'd never do. And when I saw that, when I realized how you were facing up to your responsibilities, I loved you all over again and no one was more surprised about it than I was."

"Don't give me that crap. You loved me all over again because you knew you were home free on the alimony."

"Wrong. I didn't begrudge you one cent of the support after I saw how you'd pulled your life together. The money didn't matter to me anymore. I only wanted you back."

"So you figured you'd pay Leah to go away, and then you and I would walk off into the sunset, huh?"

"Leah has nothing to do with my wanting you for myself."

"Sure, she does. You didn't want me for yourself until it looked like I was falling for her." He exhaled loudly. "This is so nuts. And I'm so out of here."

He wheeled around and headed for the door.

"Wait!" I said as I trailed after him. "You have to believe how sorry I am."

"Come on. You're only sorry I found out."

I barred the door, splaying myself against it. "You're wrong." I paused. "By the way, how
did
you find out?"

While he stood there scowling at me, I ran down my list of accomplices and speculated about which of them could have ratted me out.

Was it Desiree? Had she intervened on behalf of Leah, her A-list client, when Dan tried to postpone their wedding? That didn't seem plausible, since it implicated Leah and made Dan even less inclined to marry her.

Was it Ricardo? Had he dropped some dumb comment about my interest in keeping a record of Dan's sleepovers with his "caretaker"? He didn't even know about Desiree. It was unlikely he was the culprit.

Was it Isa? Had she blurted out something about me and the digital camera? Had she brought the camera to work and shown Dan the photographs she'd taken? She was a loose cannon, but she too was in the dark about Desiree. She couldn't have been the one to spill the beans.

Was it Mrs. Thornberg? She did know about the Desiree connection, but she was my mother figure! She was totally on my side! There was no way she would have breathed a word about my evil deeds to my ex!

Was it Weezie? She was the architect of the plan, but she was also my best friend. Yes, she'd been miffed at me for a while there, but we'd mended our fences. We were fine now. Besides, her mind was on her own marriage, not mine. With two kids and a wandering husband, she had her hands full.

Was it Nards? He was the co-architect of the plan. Did he suddenly feel the need to unburden himself to Dan, in an attempt at male solidarity? Nah. He was far too busy with his practice and his affair to bond with a man he hadn't seen in two years.

Was it—Of course not. It couldn't be. Yes, Evan knew everything, but he would never have sabotaged my relationship with Dan.
When you love someone, you want them to be happy, even if it's not with you
. That's what he'd said. But had he taken it upon himself to speak to Dan before leaving for the Bahamas? Had he written him a note? No. Not possible.

"I found out yesterday," said Dan. "At the event where I was signing autographs."

"What? How?"

"They mix it up at those things. They put everybody at one long signing table. A baseball guy sits next to a tennis player and the tennis player sits next to a hockey guy and the hockey guy sits next to a figure skater. Guess who I sat next to?"

"Dan, I have no idea," I said, knowing my whole world was seconds away from shattering. "Just tell me."

"A golfer by the name of Lynda Fox."

My mouth fell open. "Lynda Fox?"

"The woman didn't shut up for a second. I had totally tuned her out while the signing was going on. But then, after the event, we were shaking hands and out popped the juicy tidbit about you and the matchmaker. It sure ruined my day."

Lynda Fox? I never dreamed that the one, brief interaction I'd had with her at Desiree's—one stupid, stupid conversation where I'd let it slip who my ex was—would come back to haunt me. But Dan was right: she didn't shut up. It must not have occurred to her that by spilling my story, she was spilling her own.

"What did Lynda say?" I asked as calmly as I could.

"She told me all about Destiny."

"Desiree."

"Whatever. She said you were the one who came up with the brilliant idea of using a matchmaker to screw ex-spouses on their alimony. Once I heard that, I went straight to Leah, who filled in the blanks."

I couldn't get over it. I'd been undone by a player on the LPGA tour? Don't those women seem fairly harmless?

"Leah didn't fill in all the blanks," I said, continuing to block Dan's exit. He weighed many, many more pounds than I did and could easily have lifted me up and hauled me away from the door, but he was a gentleman, even then. "She didn't tell you how much I regret what I did. Oh, Dan. If I had it all to do over again, I'd never have interfered with your life or tried to worm my way out of my financial obligation to you. The only thing I'm not sorry about are these past few days we had together. They were amazing."

"You know what I think about these past few days?" No.

"That they were about the
past"

"Dan."

"It's true. Every time I pictured telling Leah the wedding was off, I couldn't do it. It finally hit me that she was the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with and that you were an old habit I was having trouble breaking."

"You're just saying that because you're hurt and angry and—"

"But now I've told her to move out of the apartment and I'm telling you to move away from the door. I'm done with both of you. Let me out of here."

I didn't budge.

"Get away from that door," he said again.

"You didn't say goodbye to Buster," I reminded him. Feeble, I know, but I was desperate.

He turned toward our dog and said, "See you Monday, Busty," then stared me down again. "Call before you drop him off, so I can make sure Isa will be there to let you in."

"Where will you be?"

"Out. As for 32G, as soon as I start the day-to-day coaching and draw a regular salary, I'll find my own place and vacate. See that? You won the game, darlin'. You got your money. You got your apartment. You scored big time. Congratulations."

I stepped aside and let him leave. There was nothing more I could say or do, no point in prolonging his misery or mine. He was right. I'd won the game. Woo-hoo for me.