Our Husband (a humorous romantic mystery) (5 page)

"Sorry, ladies," he said. "You have from here to the elevator to say your piece."

When Raymond's ashen face appeared, Beatrix crowded in next to a nurse and trotted to keep up as the bed barreled down

the hall. "Raymond! Raymond, can you hear me?"

From the other side of the bed, Natalie and the other one took up the refrain, each trying to elicit a response from

Raymond. He lay completely still, and for a spiteful second, Beatrix wondered if he were faking it—the man hated

confrontation.

"Raymond, I'm here for you," Natalie said over and over.

"I love you, Ray!" sobbed the other one.

People recoiled in their wake as they approached the elevator like a big, noisy centipede. Beatrix hated Raymond for

forcing her to take part in the embarrassing spectacle. Barely able to hear herself over the din, she shouted, "Wake up, you

coward! Wake up and face your problems like a man!" She could have sworn she saw him flinch.

Someone pried her hands from the rail as they slid the bed into the elevator. The baffled-looking doctor blocked the door

to keep the trio from boarding. "Next elevator, ladies. It'll take us a while to get him settled in. There's a waiting room on the

eleventh floor." He raised his finger in warning. "But you'll have to keep it down."

The door slid closed, nearly pinching the toes of Beatrix's Gucci loafers. She stared at her reflection in the stainless steel

doors, appalled at the thought of turning around and facing the two women her husband had... She couldn't bear to even
think

the word. More than anyone, she knew Raymond was a playboy. But if these women were telling the truth, what he'd done to

her—to all of them—was not only unconscionable, but criminal.

The young one was still caterwauling, now with a noticeable twang. Her patience exhausted, Beatrix swung around. "Will

you
please
shut up!"

The girl straightened with an abrupt hiccup, covering her mouth with her beringed left hand. Natalie stood a few inches

away, hugging her thin self. Gone was the confident medical persona. The woman looked as terrified as Beatrix felt.

Natalie caught her gaze. "What on earth do we do now?"

Beatrix closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. Natalie was easily young enough to be her own daughter, and

the other one could squeak by as a granddaughter. What could Raymond have been thinking? Her anger boiled. After a nurse

called her about the car accident and she realized Raymond was okay, she'd made the three-hour drive wearing a smirk. On the

return trip, her husband would be forced to converse with her, uninterrupted, for one hundred and eighty minutes—a special

occasion for which she'd skipped her evening sleeping pill. As a result, she was stone-cold sober for this little rendezvous.

She opened her eyes, still at a loss for protocol. "I don't know about anyone else, but I'm going to find a coffee machine."

"Did you know that the average coffee drinker consumes three and a half cups a day?" Ruby asked behind her.

Beatrix turned and pointed at the girl. "
You
are a kook. If you know what's good for you, you'll keep your distance."

An orderly gave her directions and they traipsed to a vending room in loose single file, maintaining silence by mutual

consent. Walking as if a shield encircled her, Beatrix distanced herself emotionally by staying a few feet ahead of the other

women. She punched in her selection of black coffee and watched numbly while the dark liquid bubbled out. Natalie diluted

hers with non-dairy creamer. Ruby bummed fifty cents from Natalie and opted for hot chocolate with little marshmallows—

surprise, surprise.

Minutes later, they boarded an elevator, each claiming a far corner, and rode to the eleventh floor. Beatrix hadn't

experienced a hot flash in at least two years, but her makeup was melting in anticipation of the impending discussion. Why, oh,

why hadn't she brought her pills?

At a station just outside the elevator, a nurse informed them in hushed tones that Raymond remained in critical condition

and they could visit him for ten minutes every odd hour if his condition allowed. Beatrix was already thinking she'd be looking

for a plug to pull.

The waiting room on the eleventh floor sat virtually empty except for a young couple asleep on separate couches and a

janitor vacuuming potato chips from the smelly carpet. Taking the lead, Beatrix pulled out a wobbly chair around a square

Formica table and sat down heavily, sloshing lukewarm coffee through the hole in the lid. Pale and drawn, Natalie followed

suit, and the other one joined them, her eyes welling over again.

They stirred and sipped—Ruby slurped—for several long moments while Beatrix's mind reeled. Finally, Natalie set down

her cup. "Why don't you start from the beginning, Beatrix?"

The beginning. That would be the first time she saw Raymond Carmichael at a fundraiser for a hospital clinic that would

eventually bear her father's name. Outrageously handsome in a charcoal tuxedo, ten years her junior, and on the arm of her best

friend, Blanche Grogan, Raymond had caught her eye instantly. After the toasts were made, he'd dumped her friend and pulled

Beatrix into a coat closet to share a bottle of vanilla rum until everyone else had left.

On that night, she couldn't have imagined the suffering she would bring upon herself by succumbing to Raymond's

irresistible charm—and now after years of paying penance,
this
. Damn the idle selfishness bred into her by cold, wealthy

parents. She'd learned to expect so little happiness out of life... and her expectations had been met to the letter.

Glancing up from her half-empty cup, Beatrix realized the other women were poised, nervous and waiting. "Not much to

tell, really," she said with a shrug. "Raymond and I met and were married twenty-one years ago. We've lived in the same house

in Northbend, Tennessee since then. Or at least
I
did. Raymond traveled so much..." Of course, now she knew why.

"But you were never divorced?" Natalie's voice cracked.

Beatrix managed a dry laugh. "No, we were never divorced." This situation would provide fodder for the Northbend

Country Club gossip mill for eternity.

Natalie leaned forward on her elbows, pressing her fingers to her temples. "Did Raymond have any reason to
think
the

two of you were divorced?"

"None whatsoever."

If possible, the woman's deep blue eyes grew even bleaker. Sorrowful and eroded, she remained an attractive woman. A

memory stirred, but Beatrix couldn't pin it down.

Natalie's mouth twitched. "Do... Do you and Raymond have children?"

Beatrix averted her gaze. "No." She couldn't conceive, and Raymond had refused to adopt. Just another of life's little

injustices. "Do
you
have children?"

Natalie shook her head, then joined Beatrix in a heart-pounding stare at Ruby, who swallowed hard, but at last shook her

empty head.

She allowed a pent-up sigh to escape. Thank God for small miracles.

"How did you find out he was here?" she asked Natalie.

"I received a call from a state trooper who handled the accident. You?"

"The hospital called me to verify medical insurance." She cast a glance toward the other one without making full eye

contact. "What about you?"

"Ray called me," she said with big-eyed innocence.

Beatrix joined Natalie in swallowing a gulp of bitter coffee. It was apparent who Raymond had wanted by his side, and

why he had been so surprised to see her and Natalie. She almost smiled at the irony.

"How did you meet Raymond?" Ruby asked Natalie. The young girl's mascara leaked down her cheeks. Her eyebrows

were too thin and her mouth too full for her face to be truly beautiful, but she was striking. And Beatrix suspected that under the

shapeless yellow dress lurked a magnificent body.
Raymond, you insufferable cad
.

Natalie, too, seemed to size up the younger woman while she contemplated her answer. Her mouth stretched into a wry

smile. "I met Raymond at a medical conference seven years ago."

Ruby nodded with youthful exaggeration. "One out of three people meet their mates at work."

Beatrix squinted at the girl's nonsense, then elected to ignore her.

Natalie fingered her gold and emerald wedding band—surprisingly, the only jewelry she wore—and lifted her moist gaze.

"He told me he'd been divorced for two years, and I never questioned him. I never dreamed... I mean, he traveled so much..."

Her face crumpled, but she bit her bottom lip to stem her tears.

"Where do you live?" Beatrix asked with as much calm as she could garner.

Natalie inhaled deeply, then exhaled slowly, puffing out thin cheeks. "We live—I mean,
I
live in Smiley, a small town

outside St. Louis."

"All those years, and neither of you suspected a thing?"

They turned toward Ruby. Beatrix felt a twinge of camaraderie with Natalie—at least they both shared a history with

Raymond. The little girl barely had a history, period. "How old are you?" she blurted out, her resentment unbridled.

Ruby sniffed. "Twenty-one."

Beatrix rolled her eyes. Christ, she'd probably lost her virginity to the slug. "And how did
you
meet Raymond?"

She wiped her eye, smearing blue eye shadow across her temple. "A few months ago he started coming into the place

where I work, and after a while" —she shrugged prettily—"we got to be buds."

Beatrix pressed her lips together, then asked, "And when exactly did you go from being 'buds' to being married?"

A dreamy expression softened Ruby's kohled eyes. "Ray stepped in and saved me from a rowdy customer. We went to the

late show that night and made out in the back row—" She stopped abruptly and cleared her throat. "After that, we went out

every time he was in town."

"In town?" Beatrix asked.

"Leander, Kentucky," she explained. "About forty-five minutes east down I-64."

Three wives in three states—which explained how he'd juggled the paperwork, she presumed.

"Ray surprised me on my birthday by proposing at the steak house." Ruby held out her ring again, moving her hand to catch

the light. "I'd never seen such a big diamond."

Beatrix chewed on the inside of her cheek. "Well, I hate to be the one to tell you, but you still haven't."

Ruby frowned. "Huh?"

"Cubic zirconia—it's fake."

The young woman jerked her hand to her chest. "Is not!"

Beatrix considered the wisdom of waging an "is too, is not" war. Instead, she opened her purse and withdrew a cigarette,

even though she couldn't light it. "May I ask what line of work you're in?"

"I'm a dancer," Ruby informed them with pride. "Feature show at Pink Paddy's."

Beatrix traded knowing glances with Natalie, then cut back to Ruby. "You're a stripper?"

The young woman's smile faltered a bit. "Raymond prefers the term 'exotic performer.'"

Nodding slowly with her tongue poked in her cheek, Beatrix tried valiantly to tamp down the anger that surged anew.

"Well, Raymond had a remarkable talent for putting a good spin on things."
Un-fucking-believable
. She snapped the brown

cigarette in two.

"Has," Ruby corrected.

Growing weary of the girl's wide-eyed innocence, Beatrix sighed. "What?"

"You said 'had,' like Raymond's dead or something."

"Oh, so you're a stripper
and
an English teacher?"

Ruby frowned. "You don't have to be mean."

Beatrix regarded her for a few seconds, then leaned forward. "No, I don't have to be mean. I could simply be
amused
by

the fact that my husband married two other women while still married to me!" She smacked the top of the table for punctuation.

Ruby blinked. "Well, it's not our fault that—" She broke off and lifted her cup for a nervous drink.

"That what?" Beatrix asked, pursing her lips.

Ruby squirmed.

"Not your fault that what?" Beatrix demanded, half- standing. "Not your fault that my husband wasn't satisfied with me?"

"I... I..."

"Not your fault that I couldn't keep him happy in my bed?"

Natalie closed her eyes and Ruby shrank back in her chair.

"Not your fault that my husband is a scumbag bigamist?"

"Excuse me."

Beatrix turned toward the voice. Behind the gaping janitor, the man and woman who had been sleeping on the couches

stared at them. "Would you mind keeping it down? This is a hospital, you know."

"Mind your own damned business!" Beatrix barked, standing. Her chair thumped to the carpet. She strode out of the room

in the direction of the nurses' station and asked for directions to the ladies' room. By the time she reached the tiled room, her

jaws ached from grinding her teeth. Thank God the place was empty.

She slammed into the last stall and whipped a new cigarette from her purse, cursing the cheap lighter she'd picked up at a

convenience store when she stopped to buy gas. At last the damn thing lit, and she turned an inch of the brown cigarette into ash

with the first drag. Tears and the pungent smoke burned her eyes. "How could you, Raymond?" she murmured. "How
could

you?"

The door to the bathroom opened, admitting one set of feet. Beatrix cupped her hand over the cigarette and held her breath.