The Housewife Assassin's Relationship Survival Guide (5 page)

“When did you first start having sex?” Mary asks.

Her question causes me to swipe the nail polish brush over her pinky toe, and the one beside it.

It’s Day Eight of my lockdown. I was wrong to presume that time would pass quicker if I painted my nails a different color each day. Initially I was able to coerce both Mary and Trisha to join me for my daily pampering session, but yesterday Trisha dropped out, despite the fact that the 
colour de jour
 was Disney Villain’s Cruella De Vil. 

Her excuse: “Mommy, Cruella is a meanie. Besides, my toes miss being plain old pink.” That was her way of telling me I need a new hobby. 

Don’t I know it.

Considering the subject at hand, I’m okay that today it’s just Mary and me. But let’s face it, she’s asked a loaded question. Girls have sex so much earlier than we did. (Well, than I did...) If I answer honestly, she may think I was a slut. Or a desperate spinster.

 Either way, I come off as a loser.

The GPS security bracelet on my ankle, coupled with freshly painted toes on my left foot, hobble me as I stumble over to the French doors that separate the sunroom from the media room. I lied and told the kids the bracelet was from my doctor, to strengthen my ankle against some imaginary tendonitis. 

Now I have a bigger issue to fib about: Sex.

I’m closing the doors so that my ten-year-old son, Jeff, and his pals, Cheever Bing and Morton Smith, can’t listen in on our discussion. If anything can tear them away from Minecraft, it’s a discussion about S-E-X by two people of the opposite sex, especially if one is Jeff’s older sister. 

I settle back down onto the couch and try to collect my thoughts before speaking. “I waited until I knew I was with ‘the one.’”

I’m lying, of course. Who the hell knows a guy is “the one” when they’re seventeen? Or twenty-seven, for that matter. 

I guess the proof I guessed wrong was when Carl left me with three kids.

But yes, I presumed he was “the one.” What I didn’t count on was his also being Public Enemy Number One.

While Mary tries to find meaning in my dodge, I add, “Why exactly do you want to know?”

“Because—” she pauses. “No reason. I was just wondering.”

Ah, I see. 

Mary is twelve going on twenty, and that freaks me out. Her quote-unquote steady is a cute kid named Trevor Smith, the captain of the Hilldale Middle School varsity basketball team. Right now, I want to break both his arms before he does something to Mary that he’ll regret, and she will, too.

“Sex is different from love, Mary.”

“Oh, Mom!” Mary rolls her eyes. “I know that!”

“Okay, I’ll take your word for it. So, tell me: why are they different?”

She stops to think about it. Then: “When you date, some guys only want to see how far they can get with you. You know…they don’t really treat you as a person.” She shakes her head sadly. “I don’t want to be that kind of girl.”

I nod, but say nothing. Inside I’m doing a happy dance because she actually knows the difference.

“But I think it’s exciting when a boy—a 
guy
—is just as sweet on you as you are on him.” 

“I can see that.” I try to keep my tone nonchalant as I drench a cotton ball in polish remover and wipe off yesterday’s sparkly turquoise from Mary’s left foot. “But love is different, at different ages and stages of life. And so is dating. That’s why it’s smart to date more than one guy, so you have some other experiences for comparison. The good guys always show respect, and never push you to—to do anything that doesn’t seem right.”

“Did you date a lot, before you met Dad?”

“Yes, I’d dated some, but I wasn’t that experienced.” I’m sure the color of my cheeks is almost as dark and purple as the polish I’m applying to her nails. “I was twenty when we met, and I was in college. We married within a year, after I turned twenty-one.”

“Did you feel you should have waited?”

“No. At least, not at the time.”

“But in hindsight, would you have liked to have had more experiences?”

“Yes, I wish I had. It’s hard to know what’s right for you if you’ve had too few experiences, or have only experienced one relationship that is not really working for you.”

Mary looks up sharply. “But Dad wasn’t wrong for you, was he?” 

Ah, yet another trick question. “Dad has changed a lot over the years. Then again, I have, too. “You see, Mary, not only must you both grow, you can’t have grown apart.”

“When Dad was gone all that time, did you grow apart?”

Her question rips a tiny tear in my heart. Does she suspect that Jack isn’t Carl Stone, her father? 

I search her face for the answer. What I see is innocence and curiosity. 

And trust.

It’s why I can answer her from the bottom of my heart. “To stay in love, you need respect, and passion, and above all, trust. All the time I waited for him, I trusted he would come home again.”

Carl never really came home. 

On the other hand, Jack has proven to me he is worth the wait.

Mary’s comprehension comes with a slow nod. “Mom, I think Trevor likes me as much as I like him, but sometimes I catch him looking at other girls, and that makes me jealous. So I don’t know about the ‘trust’ part. At least, not yet.”

“To find true love at such a young age is a rare thing. If it’s real, he’ll wait until you grow into the woman you were meant to be, and he’ll grow up, too. You’ll stay friends, but have other friends as well: people who make you laugh, and who you can count on to be there for you, and who will prove their friendship through trust.  If he stays your friend, he will be all that, and more.”

Mary waits until her toes dry, then she kisses me on the cheek and murmurs, “Don’t worry, Mom. I’m not ready for ‘that’ yet. I’m only asking because I know you’ll always tell me the truth.”

The truth.
 Yes, it’s what we strive to know. 

I pray she never learns the truth about her father.

“Besides,” she adds, “when the time comes, you’ll be the first to know.” 

She kisses me on the forehead then runs upstairs to do her homework.

Lucky me. 

And no matter where that first boy hides, I will track him down.

“I’ve got both good news and bad news,” Jack declares. “First some good news: I’ll be subbing for you in regard to welcome basket drop-off duty. Now, the bad news: your penance is to put the baskets together. But even better news is this: I’ve arranged for you to skip carpool duty for the next six weeks.”

 I look up from the couch. I’m so shocked by Jack’s declaration that my toenail polishing stops mid-pinky toe on the coffee table. “Oh, my God! You’ve made a pact with the Devil… I mean, Penelope? I’m almost afraid to ask what you promised her in return. It can’t be your ‘first born,’ since she views Mary as a lost cause. Let me guess: she wants to help you make your fourth.”

 “My my, you’re cute when you’re jealous! Okay yeah, invariably all conversations with that woman lead to some intimation that she is ready, willing and able for an exchange of bodily fluids. But you’ll be happy to know I let it go right over my head.”

I’m tempted to ask: 
Which head?
 But I think better of it. 

I’m afraid of how he’ll answer me.

Jack picks up the brush, dips it in the polish then places my foot on his lap. After a few meticulous strokes of 
Cruella
 on my big toe, I’ve got one more thing to admire about him.

Talk about the ideal foreplay.

“Unfortunately, I had to give her a realistic excuse as to why you’d be out of commission for so long.” He stops to admire his handiwork. “So, listen, when you come in from the cold, don’t be surprised if you find Penelope staring at your… chest.”

I yank my foot away so fast that he paints a stripe on his khakis. “What the heck did you tell her, anyway?”

“I didn’t exactly come out and say anything. It was more like a lightning round of 
Twenty Questions
.”

The way I’m holding my nail file shows him that, unlike Penelope, I’m not in the mood for any games.

“Okay, if you must know, I inferred you’d be having a few nips and tucks.” He points to my breasts.

I stare down at them. “And all this time I thought Pixie and Dixie were the picture of perfection.”

“Baby, you know I do, too! But I had to think fast. Hey, if it makes you feel any better, even she found it hard to believe. When the neighbors call you perky, it ain’t your personality they're talking about.”

“Gee thanks… I think.”

“Don’t mention it. In truth, what she bought hook, line and sinker was my hint about a butt lift.” 

The nail file misses his ear by a mere half inch. He and I both know that if I hadn’t been concerned about smearing my manicure, my aim would have been better. 

Damn it. Turns out I’m smudged after all. I point this out to him with my middle finger. “You owe me a French Tip.”

“Sounds dirty.” Tantalized, he arches a brow. “I’m in, but unfortunately it’ll have to wait. There’s been a break in the case. Ryan’s on his way over, with Abu, Arnie and Emma.”

“Super. We can have a pajama party.”

“Yep, that may be on your agenda, especially if this mission goes down the way I think it will.” He frowns. “Arnie has figured out something that all eleven Quorum suspects have in common. Unfortunately, if he’s right, only you can infiltrate their club.”

 “Anything that gets this bracelet off my ankle. Worst. Bling. Ever.” I put my leg back in his lap. “Until they get here, make yourself useful. My left foot needs a second coat.”

He hesitates, but he knows better than to say no. 

The Acme team comes bearing Krispy Kremes.

Not a good sign.

I reach for the doughnuts, but before I can grab a couple of glazed, Jack lifts the box out of reach. “Think ‘butt lift’,” he mutters out of the corner of his mouth.

Lift 
this
.

To stifle the urge to elbow him in the gut, I smile at Ryan. “Welcome! To what do I owe the honor?”

“We’ve had a breakthrough.”  He looks over at Jack, who nods and opens the doughnut box for him. 

Am I salivating as Ryan pops one into his mouth? You betcha. Some pity party this is turning out to be. “So Jack said, among other things. What’s the dealio?”

“As you know, Jonah Breck kept detailed dossiers on each of the twelve other Quorum leaders, but we’ve yet to break the encryption system used to shield their names and occupations. However, Arnie found one very strange anomaly shared by all of them.” Ryan coughs uncomfortably. 

“They’re all sugar daddies,” Arnie blurts out.

I look from one to the other. “Say, what?” 

Emma frowns. “As in, older rich dudes who like dating college co-eds for their scintillating conversation. Usually the dates take place in the fancy apartments these douchebags keep for their ‘sugar babies,’ albeit most of the time their girlfriends are too busy faking orgasms to talk about Proust or Nixonian political strategy.”

“Ah. Got it.” Suddenly my breasts don’t seem so perky. Besides, I never got through 
Swann’s Way.
 Too high falutin’.

“The online service they used to meet these ladies is among Breck Industries’ assets. It’s called SugarCEOs.com.” Ryan pauses. “Breck offered his fellow Quorum members free memberships, all of which were activated. This gave him firsthand insights into their, 
er
, personal predilections via their online profiles, which I presume he planned on using against them when the time was right.” 

Unfortunately Breck’s time ran out. Whereas the assassination attempts by his long lost daughter, Edwina Doyle, failed to take out the scumbag munitions magnate, Carl finished him off just as Jack and I were trying to convince him to turn in his Quorum buds. 

Carl also exterminated another Quorum member fighting for the top spot, which was vacant since Breck’s death. The man was Miles Lardner, a Silicon Valley venture capitalist.

There are now only eleven Quorum members standing.

Abu frowns. “Don’t their Sugar CEO profiles give us enough intel to apprehend them?” Abu asks.

“That’s the problem. One of the privileges of membership—both in the Quorum, and in Sugar CEO—is that no one knows anyone’s real names.” Ryan frowns. “Apparently both use the same encryption technology as well, which is why Arnie has yet to break it.”