Unnatural Calamities Read online

  “Is that puny, lily-livered thing a line from a play?” he asked.

  Her examination shifted to the smiling mouth again. The rest of his face had character too. His body was nothing to sneeze at either. Too bad he appeared to be fairly prosperous, unlike the men she’d had the instant hots for. He wore a gray suit and burgundy tie instead of the usual greasy jeans her hormones sang out for.

  “Um. Well. It’s a thing. An insult thing. A Shakespeare insult page on the net. The ah, Internet. We. Um. So.” She held out her hand and smiled brightly. “You must be Mr…ah.” Fabulous? Mover and shaker? She felt fairly moved, and not just because he’d scared the bejeezus out of her. Despite the tie, he was not bad. No, indeed.

  She could almost hear Penny’s whisper. “It’s a TD&H, hon. Go ferrit.” Tall, dark and handsome. Except in Penny and Janey’s past men, the “h” stood for hellish, horny, heavy-metal, Harley or ham-handed. Penny still liked bad boys. Janey had given them up years ago, about the same time she stopped smoking and a few years after she stopped drinking too much.

  The TD&H shook her hand. “Toph Dunham. Cynthia’s father.”

  “I’m Janey Carmody. Nice to meet you. But have we met?” She was certain she’d seen him before. Hard to imagine she’d forget Mr. Dunham.

  “Perhaps the first day of swim practice about a month ago? That’s the one time I gave Cynthia a lift this year.”

  “Ah. I slept through it. I usually do.” She made a face. “Not my favorite time of day.”

  She could not stare at him any longer without giving the impression she was brain damaged, but she didn’t know where else to look.

  Uh oh. Maybe at her burning dinner. She ran to the stove.

  He sniffed and gave a wide, bright smile. “Smells delicious.”

  “Scorched,” she said, staring gloomily at the veggies. “I’ll tell Rachel it’s Cajun-blackened tofu.”

  “Well,” he said, too loud and hearty. “I hate to lure you away from your feast, but how about I spring for a pizza? I mean, we could all go out.”

  Janey hesitated. “But it’s a school night.”

  “Yes, true. But the kids must eat. Come on. What do you say?”

  Mr. Mover sounded like some kind of cheerleader.

  Unfortunately it was a small apartment, so the girls had heard his jovial invitation. The veggies went into the fridge. She’d eat them for lunch for the next couple of days.

  “I’m going with Rachel,” Cynthia informed her dad as they all gathered by Janey’s car to start the which-car-do-we-take negotiations.

  Instead of answering, he shifted toward Janey and took a deep inhalation. Was he enjoying the night air or heaving a heavy sigh of distress? Janey felt a stab of indignation—going out for pizza had not been her idea.

  “Okay,” he said at last, but the girls had already packed into Janey’s car.

  Since the front seat was packed with empty clean containers for Beth, Mr Dunham would have to take his own car. They agreed to meet at the restaurant he picked, a much more upscale pizza place than Janey had in mind. She had coupons to Pizza Hut, not La Bella Luna Restaurante.

  “Janey hates bad pizza. That’s why she always makes her own,” said Rachel to Cynthia, as they picked up the oversized, leather-covered menus and waited for Mr. Dunham. He’d had to return a couple of calls and would be with them soon. Maybe that was his plan. Or maybe he was tired of the girls and wanted to dump them on Janey for a while.

  Cynthia giggled. “I can’t believe your mother lets you call her by her first name.”

  Just as Janey opened her mouth to explain, Rachel turned to her, her eyes wide with a panicked, pleading look.

  Uh oh. What?

  “Well. Ah. Rachel,” she said in a low voice.

  “Yes?”

  “May I speak to you in private for a moment? Cynthia, I see your father coming in the door. If you will excuse us?”

  She waved to Mr. Dunham, who was pulling open the heavy glass front door. He stopped to stare after her as she walked Rachel to the ladies room.

  Janey waited, her back against the edge of a sink, while a middle-aged lady washed her hands and dried them under the noisy hot air for what seemed like a half hour.

  The lady left, and Janey started. “What the hel—heck is going on? Why did you tell Cynthia I am your mother?”

  Rachel scraped at the pale green nail polish on her thumb and didn’t meet Janey’s eyes. “It’s just that it’s so embarrassing. About Penny and all.”

  Janey counted to ten. And tried to remember what it was like to be a teenager again. No, not the same at all. When she was that age she would have been delighted to tell anyone that she had a mother in prison. In fact, she would have been glad to announce her mother was in prison even though Millie, that solid citizen, had never so much as gotten a speeding ticket.

  Janey and Penny had loved to tell lies. It was their favorite hobby back then. Right up there with dressing like cheap sluts.

  “Sweetie, I know it’s hard,” she said at last. “But Penny will be released. Probably sooner rather than later. And how will you explain that? Really, you don’t have to say your mom’s in prison.”

  At the sight of her niece’s white, sad face, she growled baby Rachel’s old favorite cowpoke imitation. “Lissen, honey, you don’t have to say nuthin’. None o’ they derned business. If you need ta lie, say something like she’s a traveling saleslady. Or shooting a film in Istanbul. It’ll make your life much easier.”

  Rachel bit at her lower lip. “But you won’t tell Cynthia or her dad, will you? Please? Promise?”

  “I promise I won’t tell if you promise you will.”

  At last Rachel nodded and whispered, “Deal. But later, okay? Not tonight? Sometime later? I’ll tell Cynthia on my own. Really, I promise.”

  Janey stroked her niece’s curly hair. Confident Rachel, who so rarely showed insecurity.

  “Don’t get me wrong, sweetie. I’d love to be your mom. You are the best thing in my life, and I consider it a privilege to be your aunt. But it’s too complicated when you get started on these big lies. Believe me, I know.”

  Rachel rolled her eyes. “But you promise.”

  “Cross my heart and hope to die, stick a needle in my eye.”

  “Everything all right?” Mr. Cheerleader Dunham looked up as they walked back to the table.

  “Yes.” Rachel turned red and stared at her shoes.

  Mr. Dunham frowned, an impressive scowl with those dark eyebrows of his. He directed his glare at Janey. “Is Rachel okay?”

  “Yeah, sure.” Janey smiled. “No problem.”

  “She’s a good kid,” Mr. Suddenly Severe Dunham said.

  “Of course,” Janey agreed.

  He stared at her for another long moment, the brows still knit together in what had to be disgust. Did he think she’d dragged Rachel into the bathroom for a beating?

  “I’m fine, really,” said Rachel quickly. She even added a convincing smile.

  But the Wrath of Dunham was aimed at Janey. Maybe the man had noticed Janey’s open-mouthed admiration of him at her apartment. And he was making it very clear that he was not interested. Fine with her. She didn’t care if some overly fabulous suburban dad didn’t like her.

  At least she’d have an interesting story to tell Margaret the accountant as they waited around for the next practice to end. Maybe Margaret, a lifelong native of West Farmbrook, could interpret the strange habits of the indigenous male. Invite a woman out and then act like she’s pond scum. Perhaps it was a pre-courting ritual or test—see how the female reacts to mixed messages.

  It almost made Janey miss the straightforward men she met in her former life, like the guy in the biker bar who’d strolled up to her and said, “Hey, you’re kinda cute. Wanna screw?”

  Direct, at any rate. Unlike this Dunham who watched her continuously, but with something like disapproval.

  They shared a large pizza and drank cola.

  Everyone exclaimed th
e food was delicious, though Janey privately thought the crust not quite chewy enough and the sauce a bit dull. Nice mix of cheeses, though. If she ran the show, she’d make sure they had a good supply of real basil. None of this dried nonsense. Easy enough to grow it and freeze it in sheets.

  Beth had screwed up Janey’s old recipe for cheesy basil en croute and customers had stopped requesting it. But Janey could resurrect it once she got started and…

  Mr. Dunham was staring at her again. At least now he had a neutral expression, no more thunderous dark brow.

  “Do you do that with all of your food?” he asked.

  A disemboweled slice of pizza lay in pieces all over Janey’s plate.

  “Just to taste what’s going on,” she explained. “Easiest way to figure out ingredients.”

  “Janey is the best cook ever,” said Rachel proudly. “She wants to be a caterer.”

  Mr. Dunham smiled, and then ruined the gorgeous view by stating the obvious. “It’s very hard work.”

  “I know.” Janey poked at the cheese again. Not the best mozzarella, but not the worst either. “I’ve worked in the food industry for years.”

  “And your insurance rates would be sky high.”

  She stabbed the cheese with a fork and ate a piece. Why did he say “your” in such a fruity tone?

  Aha! There was a trace of feta in this mix; she knew it. Not a bad combination with the olives. She’d add more feta, though.

  “I’ll tell you what,” the Dunham was saying. “I might be able to help you. No promises.”

  Figures a man that gorgeous would be a salesman. She gave him a skeptical smile. “You sell insurance, right?”

  “No, I invest in businesses.”

  She leaned back in her chair and stared at him. “You are kidding me. You’re a whatsamahoosey? An adventure whatsit?”

  All those months of begging and sweet-talking loan officers and all she had to do was go out to dinner with a man who had less brains than beauty. Or so she assumed, if he was really willing to talk about backing her. She wasn’t about to tell him she was a cook and not a businesswoman.

  He smiled again. She was right—he did have the most amazing smile she’d seen for years. The ends of the nicely-shaped lips crooked upwards. “I’m a venture capitalist. Yeah. But I’m strictly minor league. Going small works, even in this economy. And I like to see people get another chance.”

  How’d he know about the near-disaster with Beth? These investor types must be on the ball when it came to local businesses.

  He continued, “I don’t know if we are in the right economic environment to start a catering business, but I’d certainly be willing to look into it.”

  “Well how-de-do,” said Janey happily. “That is just wonderful. I have scads of numbers, figures and mission statements. Business plans. Menus. Recipes. See, the idea is it’s for people who can’t afford regular caterers. I don’t use the fanciest ingredients but I take a plain old cup of chickpeas and make them something with just—”

  “She really can,” interrupted Rachel.

  “That’s wonderful,” said Mr. Dunham. “Really, really great.” Back to being a cheerleader. He did sound impressed.

  “So when can I show you all my facts and figures?” said Janey, who wondered why chickpeas made him so happy.

  “Tomorrow at breakfast. I can’t promise anything but I’d look at—”

  “Perfect,” Janey interrupted gleefully. Tomorrow? She expected to be put off. Good golly, the man must be serious. “I even promise to be awake.”

  Chapter Three

  Unlike most coffee bars in town, no quiet jazz music saturated the air of the Crestview Cafe, though occasionally some drifted in from the upscale housewares boutique next door. The bland cafe, located in the first floor of an office building, had been built to be a white-collar hangout, a place to escape the office to get some work done. So far Starbucks hadn’t driven it out yet.

  The waiter drifted over, filled Toph’s mug again and replaced the silver pitcher of half and half. At the other tables, people clicked away on laptops, or PDAs, or both as they yammered on phones. Toph was the only patron who did not fiddle with so much as a pen and pad of paper.

  Instead he stared down into his mug of coffee and wondered why, every couple of years, without fail, he did it again. He opened his mouth and invited a calamity into his life.

  First there was Bea, and later, her desire for steady work. Then Jack and his ability to spot what turned out to be modeling talent. Mickey and the law. True, they ended up successful despite the odds and their personalities. Toph recognized talent, or more likely he was blessed with extraordinary luck. Pure dumb luck.

  Some of them, like Bea, had barged into his life. Most of them, like this Carmody woman, were his own fault. He’d invited Ms. Carmody out for pizza. And informed her he had money to throw around.

  He tried telling himself he invited her because he felt sorry for the two of them, living in a tiny apartment over a garage, trying to rebuild their lives in such a conservative community.

  He was lying to himself, of course. Janey Carmody had struck him as energetic and charming the night before. In jeans and a turtleneck, her appealing wrinkly hair pulled into a ponytail, Rachel’s mother looked as cute as he first thought her. And she had an air of competence, despite the tendency to stare. More than that, he’d sensed vigor fizzing off that small body. Could be sexual, could be pure talent in other matters too.

  Toph drank coffee, and watched the street entrance for the attractive ex-con drug user he considered loaning money. He remembered the scent of alcohol he’d detected the day he first saw her at the pool, and reminded himself to add possible active alcoholic to her list.

  She couldn’t be a complete failure. No matter what her failures in life were, Janey had done something right with Rachel. Of all of Cynthia’s friends—and the girl had dozens—Toph liked Rachel best. She had a brain.

  And he enjoyed his daughter when she hung around Rachel. When the two of them got together, Cynthia ate regular food. She could go a whole evening without slapping her minuscule rear end or non-existent belly and complaining about how fat she was.

  God help the child of a model.

  Janey Carmody strode through the café door, a hefty black cloth briefcase slung over her shoulder. Her face lit with a smile when she caught sight of him and she waved.

  She shook his hand, a surprisingly strong grip for a small woman, and sat down. After a few pleasantries, she pulled out several manila folders, fussed over them and drew out papers in a manner that declared she was now all business. The polished wood table was too small to contain their coffee and her folders, so she shoveled the papers together, leaned her elbows on them and launched into an obviously well-rehearsed report of what she’d do with the ten thousand dollars she needed.

  She finished with, “Obviously since I don’t want to start out with a mountain of debt, I’d get a used van. And I think I can temporarily rent a kitchen facility from my friends at The Pickled Chug after hours.”

  “You know the owners of The Chug?” He liked the strange restaurant in the center of the city. The local paper, at a loss to come up with a better description, called it “eclectic”. Bea dismissed it as too funky for any kind of business event and Bea was always correct about matters of style.

  Janey nodded. “I went to the CIA with Lindy, one of the owners.”

  “The Central Intelligence Agency?”

  “No. The Culinary Institute of America. I’m a dropout. I had to decide between work and school and went for the work. So anyway. Well. That’s the basic idea that I wanted to talk about with you.”

  She leaned back in her chair and her shoulders seemed to slide down from her ears where she’d hunched them, as if she’d steeled herself to present a plan to a board of directors of a major corporation.

  He watched her over his cup, and wished he could be certain his impulsive offer to meet her was based on his weird ability to suss ou
t talent and not the fact that he admired the shape of her body and the grin on her freckle-sprinkled face.

  She picked up her coffee and drank it with both hands wrapped around the mug. She examined her carrot muffin and gingerly broke it apart with her fingers. Nothing elegant about those slightly reddened hands with the short nails, but they fascinated him.

  Toph envied skilled workers’ hands. Being able to produce a delicious meal seemed far more important than making too much money betting on other people’s talents.

  He watched her delicately poke at the muffin. “More food autopsies?”

  She laughed, and dropped the muffin as if it were on fire. “Rachel once informed me I shouldn’t be allowed to eat in public unless I sign a form stating I’d eat like a normal human being.”

  “What are you looking for?”

  She bent toward him conspiratorially and murmured, “I wanted to see if they used dehydrated carrots or bananas. I think it’s a yes.”

  “And you? What would you use?”

  She waggled her eyebrows and gave him a wide grin. “Fresh, of course. What did you think?”

  He thought that he was pretty desperate if a conversation about dehydrated food could bring him to the edge of lunging across the table and grabbing her for a kiss.

  He knew he had the stirring of sexual interest in Janey, but he also felt the illogical whiff of his peculiar intuition, the one that allowed him to spot winners. The whisper that told him she could be another.

  But he wasn’t going to cave in to a mere whisper. Even Toph wasn’t that rash. And speaking of careless, he reluctantly abandoned the idea of getting involved with her. He did not need any more needy people in his personal sphere.

  Back to business.

  He cleared his throat. “So tell me. Dropping out had nothing to do with Rachel or other circumstances?”

  She blinked at him. “Oh. No. Just work.”

  “I should tell you that I’m only thinking about giving you this money because of Rachel.”

  “So…” She hesitated and pushed half of the muffin around her plate. “If I wasn’t Rachel’s mother you…”