The Cocktail Club (27 page)

“Okay. I'll tell her.”

A few seconds later, she ended the call and turned her attention back to me.

“Ms. Evans is at a meeting, but she says she'll call you when she's free. She also told me to tell you that if you continue to disrupt business she will have no other choice but to call security on you,” the woman said.

That was when I lost it.

DARBY

I
felt like a wayward teenager who had to try and sneak back into the house after she had missed her curfew again. As I sped along I-10 toward my exit, I prayed that Kevin was not downstairs asleep on the sofa.

For the first time since I woke next to Chandler, I was grateful that he had the wherewithal to come close to me. That meant I'd make it home in record time. Since the only people on the roads at that time of morning were obviously adulterers and shift workers, there was no traffic jam.

I had never wanted a job so badly.

Crazy thoughts flew around in my brain like frantic, trapped birds.
What can I possibly say to explain away the fact that I've been out all night long?

“Please, don't let him be on the friggin' couch!”

Usually, when I was out with the girls, Kevin would meet me right at the sofa. When I had pried myself away from Chandler, who was still in a drunken fog, I tried to explain I had to go, and I wanted to kick myself. He knew better. Hell, I knew better.

How in the world could I have allowed that to happen? Would it be wrong for me to pray to God for mercy in this situation?

It was five-fifteen in the morning, and I had to hightail it home before my husband realized I had been gone all night. I didn't even
attempt to look at my cell phone. I had turned it off the minute I got off the freeway and slipped it under the seat of my car. There was no point in trying to retrieve it now.

A layer of sweat blanketed my forehead, and I felt a trickle run down my back. My heart beat so fast and loud as I pulled up to our house, I could barely think straight. Then it dawned on me—I hadn't showered! Chandler and I drank and fucked all over the room so many times, we probably passed out and fell off to sleep.

“Damn! I can't crawl home in the wee hours of the morning smelling like liquor and stale sex!”

I stopped the car as I reached for the button on the garage opener. It was clear I hadn't thought the situation through. It dawned on me that there was no way I could put my car back into the garage. That's where it was when Kevin and the boys left earlier, or actually, yesterday.

If I opened the garage door, the sound would wake Kevin and the boys, and there would be no question that I had just made it home. I decided to take my chances and park on the street. It didn't matter that I never did that. Desperate measures called for desperate actions.

After I parked the car, I searched for the wet wipes I kept in the middle console. I snatched a couple sheets from the packet and tried to wipe my lover's scent off my body.

That didn't help since the moist towelettes left me smelling fresh. Suddenly, I didn't know what would be worse. It seemed like I couldn't stop messing up. If I couldn't explain away the scent of sex and alcohol that seeped from my pores, how would I explain why I smelled so refreshed at the crack of dawn?

“To hell with it all!”

I eased out of my shoes when I stepped out of the car. The air
smelled dewy fresh and felt damp against my skin. Barefoot, I calmly padded my way up to the door. With sunrise on my heels, I quietly unlocked the front door and slipped inside. When I realized that the entire house was still calm and quiet, I released a breath that felt as if I had held it trapped in my lungs all the way home.

I could've cried tears of joy when it became obvious to me that I had literally made it home scot-free.

Quietly, I removed the top from the large basket near the door and dropped my shoes into it. Kevin was upstairs, so I crept into the laundry room and grabbed a sheet. It didn't matter that it was dirty. I eased onto the sofa and pulled the sheet over my body.

Moments after I had closed my eyes, my heart froze when I felt sudden brightness flood the room.

“This shit has got to stop!”

Busted!

Fear gripped my heart like a vise, and I didn't want to open my eyes. I wondered how long he'd stand there as I hoped my pounding heart didn't crack my ribcage. I couldn't continue to live the way I had been going for the past few months. It was time to come clean.

“You don't know how to answer your phone anymore, huh?” he asked.

Visions of my life, as I knew it, flashed before my eyes as the end drew near. I didn't budge. Fear rippled up and down my spine.

“You and your girls need to realize you're not in college anymore, dammit! You come sneaking up in here like I wouldn't know that you've been out damn near all night?”

My eyes snapped open. My entire body was flushed with heat as Kevin's words ran through me. I was totally taken aback. The only question I asked myself was whether I was going to accept the obvious help God had graciously handed me.

I turned my head toward my husband, who stood with a justified scowl across his face. Just when I thought I didn't have the stamina for lying anymore, some words upchucked and spilled from my lips. It was as if my brain and lips took on a life of their own. I had been ready to throw in the towel the minute the bright lights blared on, but suddenly, I heard myself say, “Peta is really having a hard time right now, that's all,” I murmured.

I purposely averted my eyes as I spoke.

For a long time, he didn't say anything. And that awkward silence forced me to look at him. Kevin's jaw tensed. He gulped and stared back at me, seemingly unable to speak. He jerked his head sideways, and I braced myself for the worst. He angled his body, edged past the sofa, and strode toward the front door.

Without another word, he threw the deadbolt, flicked off the light, and grumbled under his breath before he grasped the railing and barreled up the steps.

I fell back onto the sofa and tried to calm myself.

IVEE

A
n entire week had passed since I had seen Geneva. I didn't know if she avoided me intentionally, but I didn't go out of my way to search for her either. In my mind, everyone was either against me, or they were busily thinking up ways to try and bring me down.

Zion and I moved around our house like two strangers who needed to get out of each other's way. It really bothered me, but since most of our conversations ended in yelling matches, I decided I'd keep my thoughts, fears, and ideas to myself.

I had to admit, being home on Thursday evenings was already a foreign concept to me, but our awkwardness made it even stranger.

“You need something?” he asked.

We had been in the living room watching the local news on TV when a story about a drunk driver who killed a deputy came on. I was tempted to change the channel, but luckily, Zion hadn't uttered a word about it. In the midst of all my complaints and all my rumblings, I was grateful to God that no one was hurt or killed when I got arrested.

“No, I'm good,” I told him.

“Okay. Running to the store. I'll be back.” He got up, put on his tennis shoes, grabbed his keys, and walked out of the door.

Once alone, I began to think about how I needed to protect
myself at work. Ted had simply asked for a copy of my work contract, but I still hadn't heard back from him.

I had been tempted so many times to feel sorry for myself, but when I thought about what Kyle had done to Peta, or the mess Darby was stuck in, I tried to look at the bright side of my own horrible situation.

It hadn't been easy, but I had started to drive again. I still didn't drive to work, but I did drive to the Metro Park and Ride lot to get on a commuter bus that took dozens of professionals into downtown Houston.

For a change, I decided to do something I had avoided for far too long. I picked up my cell phone, dialed a number and waited.

“Heeeey, stranger!”

“Hey, Felicia, girl, I'm so sorry about the last time we were talking. I looked up and saw Geneva's butt standing there listening to my doggone conversation,” I confessed.

“Uh-oh,” Felicia said.

“Tell me about it.”

“Has she struck yet?”

“No, and you know that's what's killing me the most. The wait for the other shoe to drop ain't no joke when it's one of Geneva's spiked heels. Well, I don't have to tell you. You know exactly what she's like.”

“Yeah, she probably ran with that information and immediately went to work to see what destruction, if any, she could cause,” Felicia said.

“Girl, I feel like such a head case. Seriously, now I'm always thinking someone is out to get me. This crap with the DWI has left me utterly messed up in the head. And I swear, I can't feel any benefits of having this doggone lawyer!”

“What do you mean, you don't feel the benefits? You're free, aren't you? I mean, you're not in jail, Ivee. Now, don't get me wrong. I can only imagine how hard this is for you, but, honey, let me tell you. That lawyer of yours has saved you unimaginable heartache.”

“How do you know that? You ever been arrested for DWI?” I asked.

I really didn't mean for my question to sound as sarcastic as it did, but I hated when Zion, and even Ted, tried to convince me that I was better off because we had an attorney. We may have had Ted, but we still paid a grip in other fees. I still had a provisional license, had to sign up for classes, and much more.

“No, not me personally, but I have a cousin who spent six months in the county jail for it!”

“What? Six months in jail!”

“Ummm, yeah, and that ain't even the half of it. By the time she finished paying all those fees, she still had to drive around with this contraption on her car, and they made her pick up trash at the park,” Felicia said.

“Girl, bite your tongue!”

“I'm dead serious.”

“Well, shoot, how come she didn't have a lawyer?”

“Get real, Ivee. Do you think everyone can afford to pay for an attorney? She was trying to hide the whole thing from everyone, so she went with the public defender. Not only did her case drag on for months on end, but she said every time she had a court date, which was at least once every month, she'd be assigned to someone new, and that was like starting her case all over again.”

I couldn't absorb all of what Felicia said. I didn't want to.

“Well, that's downright crazy. But public defenders are real attorneys, aren't they? And why was her case passed around so much?”

“That's what I'm trying to tell you. Yeah, they're real attorneys, but in many cases, they're just starting out. They don't have the years of experience of a lawyer who specializes in a particular area, and one day they may be working on a DWI case, the next, it could be shoplifting, then it could be rape. They don't have the time or the resources to focus on any one case in particular.”

“I'm sorry, but I don't see how a first-time offender, with no prior criminal record, could spend more than a day in jail,” I said adamantly.

“Well, you don't have to
see
it, but I'm telling you what happened to my cousin. And if you don't believe me, I can have her give you a call. You better believe you are way better off with representation than without!”

“Yeah, I guess so,” I said.

I made a mental note to myself. I wouldn't express my concerns about Ted to anyone else.

“Oh, and also, she can barely get a good-paying job, since that damn arrest. It's still on her record, and if I'm not mistaken, I wanna say it's been something like three or four years now.”

“Girl, please!”

I was suddenly mad that I had called Felicia back. The last thing I needed was something else to worry about connected to the arrest. Not only did I not know how it would impact my current job, but I hadn't even given thoughts to how it would impact my future. So, now I'd have an arrest record. Good Lord!