I,” she said. “Thoughts are easier to keep secret than deeds. My husband never tried to hide his affairs, perhaps because he does not consider himself to be unfaithful to me. In his mind, adultery is not a sin, any more than having red hair is a sin. As the scorpion said to the fox, it’s simply in his nature. To give him credit, he was faithful for the first three years of our marriage, but it is unrealistic, is it not, to expect a scorpion to change its nature just because you wish it? And to be fair, he gave me a choice. He would grant me a divorce, if I wished, as long as the settlement was fair and reasonable, or I could take lovers myself, as long as I promised to be discreet. And careful, of course. Not about disease, although we were just beginning to hear about AIDS then, but about pregnancy. If he did not want children of his own, he certainly didn’t want some other man’s bastard around.”
If thoughts were sins, it was fortunate for me that I didn’t believe in hellfire and damnation, because I was doing some very serious sinning at that moment. Not only was Anna Waverley an exceptionally attractive woman, she was also fragile and vulnerable and so very lonely, which tended to bring out the ride-to-the-rescue romantic in me. Unfortunately, the romantic in me also wanted to take Anna Waverley to bed. Badly. I didn’t for a moment believe there was a chance in hell of that ever happening, but it was, I thought reluctantly, finally time to take my leave, before I dug myself in any deeper.
“… long while before I took a lover,” she was saying. “Take isn’t the right word, though. I wasn’t looking for a lover. I wasn’t sure I even wanted one. It just seemed to happen. I’ve had five lovers since then, Mr. McCall, and, with few exceptions, each was less satisfying than the last. Would you believe me if I told you that I still love my husband? No, of course you wouldn’t. Why would you? But I do. And, in his way, I suppose, he loves me as much as he’s ever loved anyone. I’ve had five lovers, when all I’ve ever really wanted was a real marriage. To Sam. Instead, I’m trapped in this sham of a marriage and having affairs I don’t really want with lovers I don’t really like.” Tears glittered in her eyes. She gestured toward the almost-empty wine bottle on the table in front of her. “And drink myself into a stupor every night so I can sleep.”
Run away with me, I wanted to say. I’ll sell my business and my house. You can dump your lover and divorce your husband. We’ll take his sailboat, fill it with good wine, and sail the South Pacific until we find a small, deserted island where we’ll build a little tree house, lie naked on the beach, drink fermented coconut milk when we run out of wine, and live happily ever after without a care in the world.
That was sure to make her smile. So what the hell, I thought, and said it. And it worked. After a fashion. It was a very sad smile, though, but a smile nonetheless. It near to broke my heart.
“That’s the nicest thing anyone’s said to me in a very long time,” she said. “Would that it were possible.”
“In some parallel universe we’ll do it,” I said.
“God,” she said, gusting alcohol fumes. “You must think I’m a crazy woman. Maybe I am. You come here to talk about your dear friend’s attack and find yourself trapped with a madwoman who gets blotto and blathers on endlessly about her pathetic excuse for a life as though you were her shrink or her priest. You poor man. If I weren’t so goddamned drunk that I’d probably fall asleep the moment I became horizontal, I’d drag you into the bedroom and make it up to you.”
“Maybe next time,” I said.
And she laughed.
Her laughter was still ringing in my head an hour later as I got into my car and drove toward home. She’d made tea and she’d talked for a while longer, although I remembered very little of what she’d said, except in the most abstract of ways. When I’d left, I’d thanked her for seeing me, she’d apologized again for subjecting me to her foolishness, and we’d shaken hands. I’d wanted to tell her that I’d like to see her again, but she’d have likely smiled sadly and said, “Perhaps in another timeline,” so I’d just let go of her hand and left. I knew, though, that I’d be calling on her again, probably within a matter of days, with whatever lame excuse was necessary to justify it, to ask if she’d have dinner with me, or go deep-sea fishing, or let me weed her garden. I didn’t know if my feelings were based on infatuation, lust, compassion, empathy, or simple curiosity, but one thing I knew for certain was that in a very short span of time Anna Waverley had entangled me in her reality. She mattered to me, or her happiness did, and I would do whatever I could short of a felony to help her be happy again. Reeny would understand, I told myself.
It was after eleven when I got home. I brushed and flossed and fell into bed, and for the second night in a row slept like a baby until my bedroom filled with pearly light. I lay in bed for a while, watching dawn brighten in the bedroom window, then slipped comfortably asleep again, waking next a few minutes past seven, whereupon I got out of bed, showered, and went downstairs. I felt wonderful, even better than I had the day before, after my night out with Jeanie Stone. It was a today-is-the-first-day-of-the-rest-of-your-life kind of wonderful. An anything-is-possible, world-is-my-oyster kind of wonderful. In fact, it felt so good to be alive that I knew, deep down inside, where thoughts dwell before you become conscious of them, that something bad was bound to happen.
It was simple thermodynamics.
chapter eleven
I’d magnanimously given Wayne and Mary-Alice Sunday morning off and I was on my own, taking a break after assembling a steel shelving unit, dabbing my barked knuckles with a wad of toilet paper, when Skip Osterman ambled into the new studio. He was carrying two large takeout coffees from the Blue Parrot espresso bar in the Public Market. Skip and his wife Connie operated a deep-sea fishing and charter company out of the Broker’s Bay Marina. Skip was always at loose ends on Sunday mornings when Connie was at church. Otherwise, they were inseparable.
“How’s Bobbi doin’?” he asked as we prised the lids from the coffee containers.
I’d called the hospital for an update before coming to the studio. “The doctor thinks she’ll be waking up any time now,” I said.
“That’s good to hear. The cops have any idea who done it?”
“If they do, they’re not telling me.”
“My money’s on Loth,” he said, blowing on his coffee. He took a cautious sip, sucking it in with a lot of air. “After Bobbi tore him a new one at the public market last month, he was goin’ around cursin’ and swearin’ about how he was goin’ to get even with her some way or another. Maybe he did.” He took another noisy slurp of coffee. “Man, there’s gotta be something we can do about that guy. Bad enough smelling the way he does, but grabbin’ his crotch and makin’ dirty remarks to women. Constable Mabel says there ain’t much they can do. Whenever they talk to him ’cause someone’s complained, he goes on about bein’ a poor sick old man who ain’t never hurt no one. But Christ on a crutch, the other day he’s on the quay and Con is at the wheel on the flyin’ bridge as we’re comin’ in from a charter, two couples from a Calgary church group on the deck, and he yells out at her that she can sit on his face any time, even if she does smell of fish. Con ignored him, but I don’t care if he’s a sick old man, I’ll take a goddamn shark pike to him next time he talks dirty to her.” He scowled and gulped his coffee.
Between them, Skip and Connie knew just about everyone who kept a boat anywhere near Granville Island, so I asked him if he knew the Wonderlust, in particular who the real owners might be.
“I know the boat,” Skip said, “but I got no idea who’s behind the company that owns it. Whoever it is,
