Sinful (31 page)

Unable to shake the chill, he lit the fireplace and wrung his hands near the flames. Chandelle startled him. He flinched anxiously. “Ahh, I didn't see you there.”

“I'm sorry, Marvin. I know you're taking this hard too,” she said, estimating that to be the cause of his nervous reaction. “These are the keys to Dior's apartment. Do you remember how to get there? Good. This is what I need you to do.” She explained in detail where to locate the shoe boxes in the bedroom. “Bring them here and don't touch anything else. I'm not in the mood to be putting my trust in police these days. In case they go back on Dior and try to pull a fast one after she rats on those murderers, there won't be anything for them to build a case with for some other stuff she's done.”

Marvin shrugged on his leather jacket and baseball cap. “She stepped into the fire, huh?”

“She must have been coming from the abortion clinic when she learned about her friend,” Chandelle enlightened him. “That's what was in that pink bag the cop handed you, an after-care kit.” She kissed Marvin on the cheek, and then asked him to be careful. “Don't forget. There's a box of money with a gun. Ain't no telling where she got it from or what crimes it can be connected to. You know Dior buys everything hot. And there's also a black book, a daily planner with all of her dirt from the past eight weeks or so. I read the names of some very powerful people in there. Bring it back here. I know what to do with it.”

 

Marvin used the keys and found the shoe boxes where Chandelle said they would be. He kept a sharp eye out for anyone tailing him. Curiosity got the better of him along the way home. He turned to the date where he expected to find his name. There it was in bold ink:
Marvin's bedroom tonight. No Viagra, no toys necessary.
Shock didn't begin to describe what zigzagged through him when he read her entries outlining how she'd followed him and reported fictitious and highly inflammatory information to Chandelle. Everything made sense then, why his world had fallen apart in a matter of days. Dior had single-handedly orchestrated it and used his wife's jealous streak as the fuel. He'd seen thousands of movies before but nothing that held a candle to Dior's diabolical plan. There was no denying it, the painful reality that Dior's sinful ways had sucked him in unwittingly. Thanks be to God and God alone that he survived by the skin of his teeth.

As soon as Marvin returned home, Chandelle met him at the door. She asked him to hide the gun and money until she figured out what to do about them; then she held out her hand for the daily planner. Marvin hesitated briefly, tempting fate with every second he delayed. “Well, you did get the black book, didn't you?” asked Chandelle.

“Yeah, I got it.” He raised his jacket and reached into his waistband. “Here it is.” Chandelle held it with both hands, opened it, and then began tearing out the pages. She tossed them into the blazing fire one by one. The glowing embers reflected in Marvin's eyes.

“Are you positive you know what you're doing?” he asked, as if it pained him to do so.

“I'm doing what I should have done the day I discovered it. I'm putting an end to this foolishness, once and for all. If Dior is going to get a break, it starts here and now. Poor thing was upstairs talking in her sleep as soon as you left. Kevlin took her to the clinic after she told him the baby was his. Men are so gullible. Just because she told him that didn't make it so.” Chandelle looked at Marvin knowingly, and then smirked at him as the last page floated into the fiery furnace. “I don't ever plan on discussing this again, you understand me?”

“Oh, of—of course not,” he answered uneasily.

“And I'll expect you to be all moved in by the end of next week. Agreed?”

“Uh…uh…agreed,” he stuttered, realizing then that it had been revealed to Chandelle who the father was.

“I told you that I had a cross to bear for teaching Dior the ways of the world. Less than an hour ago, God strapped it down to my back extra tight to remind me,” she said, pecking him on the lips. “Good night, Marvin. Lock the door on your way out.”

A READING GROUP GUIDE

SINFUL

VICTOR McGLOTHIN

ABOUT THIS GUIDE

The questions and discussion topics that follow are intended to enhance your group's reading of this book.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. Do you think that Dior's department store antics should have landed her in the Happy Horizons mental care facility or in jail?
   
2. Why do you think Dior was so jealous of Chandelle?
   
3. Do you think that Chandelle should have taken her cousin in considering her scandalous past?
   
4. What do you think about Marvin's decision to keep quiet after having been propositioned by Dior when she was in her underwear?
   
5. Did you think Chandelle was wrong to give the furniture away and have the utilities cut off as a way to get back at Marvin?
   
6. Why do you think Dior went back to the dangerous world of “birthday threesomes”?
   
7. When Marvin was in jail, why do you think he called Kimberly Hightower instead of Dave, his father's friend?
   
8. What importance did Dooney play in the story?
   
9. Should Chandelle have filed for divorce after seeing Marvin at the supermarket with Kim?
   
10. Did you think it was over between them when he put her out of his apartment?
    
11. Do you think Dior got off easy considering all of the trouble she caused, including being responsible for Isis's death?
    
12. How do you feel about Chandelle's decision to stay married after hearing Dior's confession about Marvin's baby?
    
13. Should Marvin have told Chandelle about his sexcapade with Dior? If so, when?
    
14. Who do you think grew the most during the story, Dior, Chandelle, or Marvin?
    
15. Discuss whether you think a person like Dior can really change her ways? Why do or don't you feel that way?
    

Here's a preview of Victor McGlothin's novel
Ms. Etta's Fast House.
Coming in October 2007 from Dafina Books!

T
hree months into 1947, a disturbing calm rolled over St. Louis, Missouri. It was unimaginable to foresee the hope and heartache that one enigmatic season saw fit to unleash, mere inches from winter's edge. One unforgettable story changed the city forever. This is that story.

Watkins Emporium was the only black-owned dry goods store for seven square blocks and the pride of “The Ville,” the city's famous black neighborhood. Talbot Watkins had opened it when the local Woolworth's fired him five years earlier when he allowed black customers to try on hats before purchasing them. The department store manager had warned him several times that clothing apparel wasn't fit for sale after having been worn by Negroes. Subsequently, Mr. Watkins used his life savings to start a successful business of his own with his daughter, Chozelle, a hot-tempered twenty-year-old who had a preference for older, fast-talking men with even faster hands. She often toyed around with fellows her own age when the opportunity to lead one of them around by the nose presented itself. Chozelle's scandalous ways became undeniably apparent to her father the third time he'd caught a man running from the back door of his storeroom, half-dressed and hell-bent on eluding his wrath. Mr. Watkins clapped an iron padlock on the back door after realizing he'd have to protect his daughter's virtue, whether she liked it or not. It was a hard pill to swallow, admitting to himself that canned meat wasn't the only thing getting dusted and polished in that back room. However, his relationship with Chozelle was just about perfect, compared to that of his meanest customer.

“Penny! Git your boney tail away from that there dress!” Halstead King grunted from the checkout counter. “I done told you once, you too damned simple for something that fine.” When Halstead's lanky daughter snatched her hand away from the red satin cocktail gown displayed in the front window as if a rabid dog had snapped at it, he went right on back to running his mouth and running his eyes up and down Chozelle's full hips and ample everything else. Halstead stuffed the hem of his shirttail into his tattered work pants and then shoved his stubby thumbs beneath the tight suspenders holding them up. After licking his lips and twisting the ends of his thick gray handlebar mustache, he slid a five-dollar bill across the wooden countertop, eyeing Chozelle suggestively. “Now, like I was saying. How 'bout I come by later on when your daddy's away and help you arrange thangs in the storeroom?” His plump belly spread between the worn leather suspender straps like one of the heavy grain sacks he'd loaded on to the back of his pickup truck just minutes before.

Chozelle had a live one on the hook, but old man Halstead didn't stand a chance of getting at what had his zipper about to burst. Although his appearance reminded her of a rusty old walrus, she strung him along. Chozelle was certain that five dollars was all she'd get from the tight-fisted mister, unless, of course, she agreed to give him something worth a lot more on the back end. After deciding to leave the lustful old man's offer on the countertop, she turned her back on him and then pretended to adjust a line of canned peaches behind the counter. “Like what you see, Mr. Halstead?” Chozelle flirted. She didn't have to guess whether his mouth watered, because it always did when he imagined pressing his body against hers. “It'll cost you a heap more than five dollars to catch a peek at the rest of it.”

“A peek at what, Chozelle?” hissed Mr. Watkins suspiciously, as he stepped out of the side office.

Chozelle stammered while Halstead choked down a pound of culpability. “Oh, nothing Papa. Mr. Halstead's just thinking on buying something nice for Penny over yonder.” Her father tossed a quick glance at the nervous seventeen-year-old obediently standing an arm's length away from the dress she'd been dreaming about for weeks. “I was telling him how we'd be getting in another shipment of lady's garments next Thursday,” Chozelle added, hoping that lie sounded more plausible. When Halstead's eyes fell to the floor, there was no doubting what he'd had in mind. It was common knowledge that Halstead King, the local moonshiner, treated his only daughter like an unwanted pet and that he never shelled out one thin dime toward her happiness.

“All right then,” said Mr. Watkins, in a cool, calculated manner. “We'll put that there five on a new dress for Penny. Next weekend, she can come back and get that red one in the window she's been fancying.” Halstead started to argue as the store owner lifted the money from the counter and folded it into his shirt pocket, but it was gone for good, just like Penny's hopes of getting anything close to that red dress if her father had anything to say about it. “She's getting to be a grown woman and it'd make a right nice coming-out gift. Good day, Halstead,” Mr. Watkins offered, scaling the agreement and extending his cheapest customer the opportunity to slink his conniving behind out of the same doorway he'd tramped in.

“Papa, you know I've had my heart set on that satin number since it came in,” Chozelle whined, as if the whole world revolved around her. Directly outside of the store, Halstead slapped Penny down onto the dirty sidewalk in front of the display window.

“You done cost me more money than you're worth,” he spat viciously. “I have half a mind to take it out of your hide.”

“Not unless you want worse coming to you,” a velvety smooth voice threatened from the driver's seat of a new Ford convertible with Maryland plates.

Halstead glared at the stranger, then at the man's shiny beige roadster. Penny was staring up at her handsome hero with buttery complexion for another reason altogether. She turned her head briefly, holding her sore eye, then glanced back at the dress in the window. She managed a smile when the man in the convertible was the only thing she'd ever seen prettier than that red dress. Suddenly, her swollen face didn't sting nearly so much.

“You ain't got no business here, mistah!” Halstead exclaimed harshly. “People known to get hurt messin' where they don't belong.”

“Uh-uh. See, you went and made it my business by putting your hands on that girl. If she was half the man you pretend to be, she'd put a hole in your head as sure as you're standing here.” The handsome stranger unfastened the buttons on his expensive tweed sports coat to reveal a long black revolver cradled in a shoulder holster. When Halstead took that as a premonition of things to come, he backed down like most bullies when confronted by someone who didn't bluff so easily. “Uh-huh, that's what I thought,” he said, stepping out of his automobile idled at the curb. “Miss, you all right?” he asked Penny, helping her off the hard cement. He noticed that one of the buckles was broken on her run-over shoes. “If not, I could fix that for you. Then, we can go get your shoe looked after.” Penny swooned, as if she'd seen her first sunrise. Her eyes were opened almost as wide as Chozelle's, gawking from the other side of the large framed window. “They call me Baltimore, Baltimore Floyd. It's nice to make your acquaintance, Miss. Sorry it had to be under such unfavorable circumstances.” Penny thought she was going to faint right there on the very sidewalk she'd climbed up from. No man had taken the time to notice her, much less talk to her in such a flattering manner. If it were up to Penny, she was willing to get knocked down all over again for the sake of reliving that moment in time.

“Naw suh, Halstead's right,” Penny sighed after giving it some thought. “This here be family business.” She dusted herself off, primped her dry twigged pigtails, a hairstyle more appropriate for much younger girls, then she batted her eyes like she'd done it all of her life. “Thank you kindly, though,” Penny mumbled, noting the contempt mounting in her father's pensive expression. Halstead wished he'd brought along his gun, and his daughter was wishing the same thing, so that Baltimore could make him eat it. She understood all too well that as soon as they returned to their shanty farmhouse on the outskirts of town, there would be hell to pay. Although whatever Halstead saw fit to beat Penny with, it wasn't no never mind to her. At age seventeen, with scuffed knees and ashy elbows, Penny became a woman that day in front of Watkins Emporium. There was no turning back now.