LITMIR.BIZ

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“It’s not a passive thing, you know? You have to work it out of you. Or something has to. Someone. If you’re lucky, you meet a woman who finally obliterates all trace of the one who – who came before. Or knocks the memory down to a tolerable level, anyway.”

      “Penn!” Caitlin called from the gallery. “I need to get over to the paper. Get me a gimlet for the road.”

      At that moment, Lily touched Waters’s shoulder and said, “Go take care of that girl, Penn Cage. I need my husband.”

      Penn smiled and walked over to the steps, but as he ascended them, he glanced back over his shoulder, and Waters saw deep interest in his eyes.

      “Let’s go,” Lily said quietly. “I’d like to just slip around the side of the house, but we need to tell Mike we enjoyed ourselves.”

      Waters followed her up the steps and into the main hall. Conversation indoors had grown to a din, and most faces were flushed from alcohol. Lily walked quickly to discourage buttonholing, but she kept an eye out for their host as she picked a course through the crowd. As they neared the front door, she caught sight of him, but there were too many people between them to make progress. Mike helplessly turned up his hands, then blew Lily a kiss and waved good-bye. Waters nodded thankfully and started toward the door with Lily on his heels. He had his hand on the knob when an old woman cried, “Lily Waters, it’s been a coon’s age! You come here and talk to me this instant!”

      Lily reluctantly broke away and walked to a lushly upholstered chair to pay her respects to a grande dame of the Pilgrimage Garden Club.

      As Waters stood in the crowded hall, a cool hand closed around his wrist, and something feather-soft brushed the side of his face. Before he could react, a sultry voice said, “You didn’t imagine anything, Johnny. It’s me. Me. Call me tomorrow.” Then something wet brushed the shell of his ear. Before he could jerk away, sharp teeth bit down on his earlobe, and then the air was cold against his skin. He tried not to whirl, but he turned quickly enough to see the red dress and black mane of hair vanish through the door.

      He thought Eve was gone, but then she reappeared, the upper half of her face hidden by an eerily predatory mask of sequins and feathers. She did not smile, but her gaze burned through the eyeholes of the mask with such intensity that a shiver went through him. Then the door closed, and she was gone.

      “I’m ready,” Lily said from his left. “Let’s go before someone else traps me.

      Waters began to walk on feet he could barely feel. You didn’t imagine anything … It’s me …

      He hesitated at the door. If he walked outside now, he and Lily would have to go down the steps and stand with Eve while they waited for the valets to get their cars. He would have to make small talk. Watch the women measure each other. Call me tomorrow …

      “What’s the matter?” asked Lily.

      “Nothing.”

      Lily pulled open the great door and walked through. Waters hesitated, then stepped out into the flickering yellow light coming from the brass gasolier above their heads.

      Eve stood at the foot of the wide steps, her back to them, waiting for her car. Her shoulders were bare, her skin still tanned despite the changing season.

       You didn’t imagine anything, Johnny …

      As Lily started down the steps, Waters caught movement to his left and instinctively turned toward it. Standing on the porch smoking a cigar was Penn Cage’s father, Tom Cage. A general practitioner who had treated Waters’s father until his death, Tom Cage took a token position in all of Waters’s wells. He’d had a three sixty-fourths interest in the Jackson Point deal.

      “Hey, Doc,” Waters said, stepping over and extending his hand. “You recovered from that spanking we took?”

      “I’m philosophical about losses,” Dr. Cage replied. “I don’t risk much. I never make a killing, but neither do I lose my buttocks.”

      “That’s a good attitude.”

      Tom smiled through his silver beard. “You should recommend it to your partner.

      “Cole?”

      “Last time Smith was in my office, his pressure was way up. And that scotch isn’t doing his liver any favors. Or his diabetes.”

      Cole had been diagnosed with adult-onset diabetes two years ago, but he ignored his condition so regularly that Waters sometimes forgot he had it. “I’ll talk to him,” he promised.

      “Good. He doesn’t give a damn what I tell him. And make him take that pressure medication. If it’s giving him side effects, we’ll find another drug.”

      “Thanks.”

      Waters looked down the steps and saw Lily standing alone as Eve Sumner swept toward the driver’s door of a black Lexus. Eve didn’t acknowledge Waters, but she winked at Lily before she disappeared into the car’s interior. As Waters gaped, the Lexus shot forward with an aggressive rumble.

      He descended the steps and stood beside Lily as the Acura pulled up the circular drive. “She must sell a lot of houses,” he said, trying to sound casual. “That was an LS-four-thirty.”

      “I wonder who paid for it,” Lily said archly. “But maybe she did. All the real estate agents drive more car than they can afford. They think image is everything in that business.”

      Waters got out his wallet and took out some ones for a tip.

      “She told me she’d like to see the inside of our house sometime,” Lily went on. “That means someone’s interested in it.”

      “What did you tell her?”

      “That Linton Hill won’t be on the market for as long as I’m alive.”

      “That’s pretty definite.”

      “It won’t put Eve Sumner off for a week. Watch and see.” Lily brushed something off the front of her dress. “I wonder if her breasts are real.”

      Even in his unsettled state of his mind, Waters knew not to touch that one. Still, the question surprised him. Lily wasn’t usually given to such comments. Eve Sumner seemed to bring out the cat in her. Maybe she had that effect on all women; hence, her reputation.

      “Don’t pretend you didn’t notice them,” said Lily. “She told some girls down at Mainstream Fitness they’re real, but I think they’re store-bought. She’s a fake-baker too.”

      “A what?”

      “Her tan, John. Here’s the car.”

      Waters tipped the valet and got behind the wheel, his inner ear still cold from the saliva Eve Sumner had left on his skin.

       FOUR

      “What do I think? I think you’re losing your mind.”

      Cole Smith leaned back in his sumptuous office chair, kicked a pair of gleaming Guccis up on his desk, and lit a Macanudo. His eyes shone with incredulity.

      “So how do you explain it?” asked Waters.

      “Explain what? Evie wants to do the wild thing. Where’s the mystery?”

      “I’m talking about what she said.”

      “What she said?” Cole shrugged. “Okay, let’s recap. At the soccer field she said zip. Right? She blew you a kiss.”

      “It looked like she said, ‘Soon.’ I told you that.”

      “It looked like she might have said that. But Eve Sumner has no way of knowing what secret things you and Mallory said to each other twenty years ago. And since she didn’t actually

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