The Housewife Assassin's Killer App (5 page)

The arrest was a mistake. A Department of Justice wonk thought I was aiding and abetting my terrorist soon-to-be ex-husband, Carl. Ha, as if! Despite Carl’s attempts to sully my reputation, I handled the situation in a most honorable and lady-like manner. Granted, it meant executing the island jailbreak of a Mexican drug lord, only to lose most of him to a hungry shark. But, all’s well that ends well, since I was able to hold onto his head, which was tattooed with the bank vault combination containing the floor plan to the Quorum’s secret hideout.
 

It’s still early enough that the sun isn’t so hot as to make a lady glisten, as my mother used to say.
 

Until recently, we’ve been houseguests of an Acme colleague—Dominic Fleming, whose pseudo-chateau is right around the corner. Our own house was rebuilt after a tremendous fireball scorcher, which left nothing but ash and cinder.

Did I forget to turn off the iron, or leave the stove unattended? If only! In truth, Jack and I were escaping from another raid—this time, by an NSA SWAT team.

And you thought your neighbors were pains in the ass.

The move back was a bear. For the first three months, the contractor dragged his heels—that is, until I took him to the shooting range. Watching me drill fifty rounds into the genital area of a paper target man convinced him to take me at my word when I said I wanted to be in our house no later than Mother’s Day.

Besides buying all new furniture, the kids needed new clothes. It was like Christmas all over again.

I’m sure I won’t feel that way when I see my next home insurance rate increase.

The wind picks up as I snip the most egregious rose branches. The fragrant scents of the flowers drift over me in the now-cool breeze.
 

A half-hour later, though, the sun has ducked behind a dark bulging cloud. I’m not very far along in my work, but already a few fat sprinkles have dampened the sidewalk. I’ve been placing the fallen flowers stem-side down in a bucket. It’s now time to separate those holding fresh roses from those with petals long past their peak. The former will be placed in vases throughout the house. As for the latter, I’ll ask my daughters—fourteen-year-old Mary, and seven-year-old Trisha—if they’d like to help me make sachets from the roses’ petals and an old lace curtain I’ve held onto, for just this very reason.
 

Only then do I notice that I’ve got an audience. An elderly woman, wheelchair-bound, sits just a few feet from me. Is she visiting the MacMillans, the neighbors on our right? I don’t remember them saying they expected company.
 

As our eyes meet, she smiles shyly. “You’re Donna Stone, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” I say, as I push back the brim of my hat to get a better look at her.
 

“My, my! I heard your roses were beautiful,” she gushes. “I can see why you’re celebrated for your green thumb.”

“Really? Well…thank you for saying so.” Better that, than night raids by local agency SWAT teams.
 

I pick up a dozen of the fresh ones and walk over to her with them. “Would you care for these?”

“How generous!” Pleased, she holds out a hand and takes them. “One good turn deserves another. I’ve got something for you too.” With the other hand, she gives me an envelope.
 

“Oh! Why…thank you.” Of course, I take it. Graciousness was drilled into me from the time I was a toddler. “Should I open this now?”

“That’s entirely up to you. Don’t take it personally, but you’ve been served,” the woman says over her shoulder, as she wheels away from me. “Thanks for these!”
 

I stare after her. A moment later, I’ve ripped open the envelope to discover that Carl is asking for full custody of our children, based on his claim that I’m an “unfit mother.”

The nerve of the man! Why, he made the Interpol Most Wanted List a full year before I was placed on it. Talk about selective memory.

I don’t have to accept his reality. For that matter, I don’t have to accept this subpoena, either.

I shout, “Wait!” But the woman has already rounded the corner. I have to hurdle over the Shumways’ red-tip hedge to catch up. Even Mitzi’s glare can’t stop me from cutting across her front yard.
 

Doing so puts me neck and neck with Miss Wheelchair 1964. I grab her chair by its handles and pull her to a halt. “How dare you!”

The woman shrugs. “Lady—I’m just doing my job.”

I move to the front of her chair and lean on the arms with both hands. I don’t care that a couple of neighbors across the street have stopped their gossiping in order to stare at us. “Nope, sorry. This is unacceptable,” I insist. “You came up to me under false pretenses.”

She rolls her wheels over my feet.
 

“Ouch, that hurt!” I hop on my right so that I can grab the left one and rub the soreness out of it.

She smiles up at me and murmurs sweetly, “Well, dearie, I asked your name, and confirmed you were the party being served. By law, it’s the only thing I have to do—that, and hand you the papers.”

“It wasn’t right! I was on my own property, which means you were trespassing.”

She shakes her head. “Technically, you were on the public sidewalk.”

Okay, yeah, she has a point.

Still, that doesn’t stop me from snatching the flowers out of her lap.

“You gave those to me!” She grabs them back.

“Buy yourself a dozen with whatever money you’ve made by making my life miserable.” I yank back as hard as I can—

The buds come off in my hands. Worse yet, the thorns have shredded my palms to bits.

I’ll survive. Besides, she’s left holding nothing but the stems.
 

Her involuntary reflex—to roll away from me—deposits her left wheel in a rain grate. Every attempt to maneuver out of it only secures her right wheel even deeper into a crack.

Hopefully, she’ll be stuck there until the next Great Flood.

For a moment, her rage reddens her face. But then her lip quivers. “You can’t just leave me here! I’m a defenseless old lady!”
 

“Oh, no? Watch me.”
 

I turn to leave—

Only to bump into the small crowd that has gathered around us. I guess I should be concerned that everyone thinks I’m some sort of bully, but quite honestly, I’m so angry right now, I can’t see straight.

As I rush by my neighbors, I hear Tiffy Swift, one of my carpool partners, mutter to Mitzi, “How could anyone be so cruel to that poor thing?”

If only she knew.

I guess she will, and soon. She and the rest of her coven—Hayley Coxhead and the all-time queen of mean, Penelope Bing—will have yet one more reason to snicker when I’m in view.

By now, sheets of rain are falling. Soaked, I toss the crushed buds into the bucket with the rest of the cut flowers and make a run for the house. Now, besides making Jack’s cake, I’ve got another task:

Telling my children that the man I love is not their father.

First things first: I’ve got to see my divorce attorney.

I am nothing like the three other women in Alan Shore’s waiting room.
 

I don’t accessorize cropped razorback running tees and ass-lifting yoga pants with precious diamond tennis bracelets worth more than my home mortgage.
 

I’m not on my third, fourth, or fifth husband—and trying to get away from him.

And I don’t bring my maid to my appointment with my divorce attorney so that she can take notes for me.

In fact, I don’t have a maid.

Admittedly, it’s the one thing I covet from these ladies.
 

Okay, that and the tennis bracelet.
 

I may have walked in last, but my name gets called next. The twenty-dollar bill I palmed to Alan’s receptionist buys me VIP status.
 

At the same time, it earns me laser-sharp glares from the other women. Well, too bad. My children’s wellbeing is at stake, so, hell yeah, baby, I’m jumping the line.

Besides, it’s cocktail hour in Paris. At least, that will be Alan’s excuse for tippling even this early in the day. And let’s face it: he may be a conniving bastard genius, but he’s less lucid when he’s too far into his cups.

So, yes, I’m next in line for some of his sage, if cockeyed, advice.

I wouldn’t trade that for a million tennis bracelets.

Alan doesn’t rise when I enter. For that matter, he doesn’t even look up.
 

Maybe that’s a good thing, since his personal barber has a straight razor at his throat.
 

“Joanie, long time no see! January, two years ago, right? Wasn’t that the big shakedown for Husband Number Three? Gee, how time flies when you’re having fun.”

By the way I open a spare straight razor with a flick of my wrist and trim Alan’s cowlick into a Mohawk without him feeling it, the barber knows I’m serious about getting Alan’s undivided attention and does the smart thing: He grabs his gear and scurries out the door.

“Alan, it’s not Joanie.” Of course, he knows my voice.

Slowly, he peeks out from under the warm towel wrapped around his face. Seeing me, he practically falls out of his chair. “Donna! I—I wasn’t expecting you—”

“That’s quite alright. Your receptionist understood the severity of my emergency and slipped me in.” My voice oozes peaches and cream, but by the way I hold the razor—next to his neck—he knows I’m not a happy camper.

He frowns. “Yeah, okay, what can I do for you?”

I snort. “According to your billable hours—over a hundred, to date, and counting—you should have done it already! Don’t you remember? You’re supposed to be my first line of defense in my divorce from Carl Stone, lately of the District of Columbia! Or have you forgotten it’s why I pay you such a princely sum?”

“If I remember correctly, I’ve got you on the ‘practically pro bono plan,’ which, frankly, makes me a gentleman, considering nothing about this divorce is easy.”

“Pro bono? Is that what you call it?” Oops, my bad, I’ve pricked his neck.

He yelps, but only after I lift the razor so that he can see the droplet of blood on its blade.

He leaps out of the chair and backs away. “On top of driving a hard bargain with me, and considering that you refuse to take a dime from him, yes, that’s exactly the right word for it.”

“Of course I won’t take money from him! If I do, it validates his role in my children’s lives, even after he deserted them—and me.” I’m trying hard to keep my eyes from clouding up with tears. “Not to mention the lies he’ll tell them—about himself, about Jack…and about me.”

“Believe what you want, but if this goes his way, you’ve only yourself to blame,” he mutters.

“Oh? How so?”

“Since you won’t take alimony or child support, Carl doesn’t believe you’re willing to play hardball.” He dabs the towel to his neck. When he sees a spot of blood, he gulps hard and backs away from me. I can tell by the worried look in his eyes that he’s wondering if he should say what he really thinks.
 

To encourage him to do so, I toss the blade to one side.

Relieved, he sighs. “Look, Donna, I’m doing the best I can. But to tell you the truth—I know, rare in my profession—my people have had a hell of a time getting anywhere near Carl to subpoena him for a deposition, because he’s surrounded by his personal storm trooper battalion…twenty-four seven. Not only that, he’s got everyone but the justices of the Supreme Court offering themselves up as character witnesses as to why he should share custody with you. Let me put it this way, my dear Mrs. Stone: you can’t fight city hall, let alone Capitol Hill. He won. You lost. Suck it up.”

I brush away a tear. “I can’t do it, Alan! I can’t allow him near them!”

“If that’s the way you feel, keep doing what you do best—dodging the summons server. Maybe Carl will get tired of all these shenanigans and blow it off.”

“I…well…” I hand him the subpoena. “Unfortunately, a process server got to me.”
 

Alan’s eyes narrow. “Part of your ‘pro bono’ fees went to buying off—I mean, retaining—every process server in the LA metro area, so that they could pass on the honor of serving you. So, what did this guy look like?”