Break On Through (9 page)

Eli rolled his eyes. “Until Christmas,” he told Reed. “Or maybe sometime in November.”

“I’ll go get your mom—”

“No!” Obie’s small face appeared above the bottom of the window opening. “Don’t!”

The little guy’s obvious concern gave Reed pause. “What’s going on, kid?”

When Obie didn’t answer, his big brother did it for him with another eye roll. “It’s his homework assignment. He doesn’t want to write about what he’s going to be for Halloween.”

“I’m never trick-or-treating,” Obie said, shuddering. “Never never never.”

Whoa
, Reed thought. This was serious. “Are you allergic to candy?”

“I love candy,” Obie said, as if he thought Reed was crazy. “Everybody loves candy.”

“Which makes Halloween the perfect holiday, right?”

The little boy wagged his head back and forth. “The perfect holiday for
zombies
.”

Reed slid his gaze toward Eli, who sighed. “Some kids at school told Obie that in this neighborhood the zombies come out on Halloween night.”

“They don’t live in Tulare,” Obie said. “They live here.”

“I can assure you…” Reed began.

“Don’t bother saying there aren’t zombies,” Eli advised. “He won’t believe you.”

“That’s because it’s true,” Obie said.

Reed shoved his hand through his hair again. “I’m trying to follow your logic, Obie. I really am. But how is hiding out in my treehouse to skip your homework assignment going to save you from the, uh, undead?”

Obie gave him a pitying look, then held up one finger. “If I do my homework and write about what I want to be, then Mommy will make the costume.” Another finger joined the first. “If I have a costume, she’ll make me trick-or-treat.” His ring finger joined the others. “If I’m out in the dark trick-or-treating, then…
zombies
.”

“Uh…” Reed looked to Eli for further advice, but the older boy just shrugged. “But, Obie.” Reed cleared his throat, thinking fast. “Your mom will be there, right? On Halloween she’ll trick-or-treat with you and make it okay.”

Too late, he saw that Eli was shaking his head.

“Don’t you know anything?” Obie’s expression was horrified. His voice rose. “The zombies get the mommies
first
!”

Clearly the kid had quite the imagination, something Reed couldn’t condemn him for, of course. Once again, he considered bringing Cleo into the mix, but he wrote for the children’s market. Surely he could reason with one of the breed.

“Obie,” he called up to the window, where he could see that freckled face and big blue eyes. “Why don’t you come on down and we can talk about this like reasonable men?”

Obie’s blond eyebrows drew together.

“I have M&Ms.” Every writer did. Sometimes you gave yourself one as a reward for each paragraph written. Other times, for each word. When the muse was really quiet… “I have a
lot
of M&Ms.”

Turning toward the house, he called over his shoulder. “I’ll just go get them. If you’re down when I get back, we can break open the bag.”

A little voice piped up. “Peanut or regular?”

Reed had every kind, but he thought he might know the correct answer in this instance. “The ones with peanut butter inside.”

Without a thought to cavities or spoiling appetites, Reed fetched the candy. For a second he pondered bringing a bowl along, but this was a males-only event. They were duty-bound to forego the niceties.

And sure enough, it looked as if they would, because Obie and Eli were both on the ground, the two of them sitting side-by-side on the chaise lounge that was part of the grouping of outdoor furniture placed on the kidney-shaped flagstone patio.

Obie was so small his legs didn’t reach the ground. They hung down, bare between the hem of his shorts and the cuffs of his white socks. Coming closer, Reed stared at the skinny limbs, the knobby knees. Another kid invaded his mind. White legs and small shoes suspended overhead…

He gave a sharp shake of his head to dislodge the image, then rattled the candy in the bag. “Who needs sugar?”

They all did. The three of them sat in silence for a few minutes, passing around the chocolate-covered peanut butter morsels. Reed finally felt sufficiently nourished to tackle the subject at hand.

“I have an idea, Obie. Maybe you could wear a costume that would throw the zombies off the scent.”

The boy narrowed his eyes. “So there
are
zombies here.”

“Not that I’ve ever seen,” Reed replied. “And I’ve been here a handful of Halloweens.”

“Told ya,” Eli said to his brother, with the hint of sneer.

Reed held up his hand, gave the older boy a look. “‘There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.’”

“My name’s Eli.”

He should have seen that coming, Reed thought with a sigh, grabbing for the bag of candy. “What I meant,
Eli
, is that none of us can say for certain.”

“I’m not believing in zombies,” Eli muttered.

“What’s this about a costume?” Obie demanded.

“Here’s the deal.” Leaning forward, Reed rested his forearms on his knees. “What I know about zombies isn’t a whole lot, but they’re purported to be interesting in eating human flesh.”

“And human brains,” Obie added, his eyes going wide.

“And human brains.” Reed nodded. “So if you trick-or-treat on Halloween as something not human, then if the zombies are around, they’ll overlook you, right? They’ll be going after the pirates and the princesses.” For a moment he wondered whether this was the wrong tack, but new light was sparking in Obie’s eyes. “The knights and the ninjas.”

“The Supermans and the Spidermans,” the boy added, with bloodthirsty glee.

Reed frowned. “I’m not sure about superheroes, but you might be right. They have human shape, so they could be at risk.”

“But if I go as a…as a…”

“Telephone,” Eli suggested. “A pencil. How about a big pair of sunglasses?”

“Those are boring,” Obie said, his face falling.

“I’m sure you’ll think of something,” Reed put in hastily. “A costume that’s non-human and non-boring.”

Obie seemed to mull it over. “There’s just one problem.”

“Yeah?”

“The mommies.
My
mommy.”

Cleo, with her brilliant blond hair, her long legs, her kissable mouth. Yeah, he didn’t want a zombie or anyone else harming her. “I’ll bet you could convince her to dress as something non-human too.”

Scratching his nose, Obie pursed his lips. “I don’t know…” He glanced toward the treehouse.

Reed didn’t want all his efforts to come to naught. “Maybe you can go as part of a larger group. Protection in numbers, right?”

“Mom doesn’t really know anybody around here,” Eli said. “And you know what some of the kids are like.”

Shit
, Reed thought, searching for a straw to grasp. “Do you think your dad might come to visit and take you?”

“
Take us?
” Obie nearly screeched the words.

“I mean take you trick-or-treating,” Reed hastily amended, even as a sick feeling began roiling in his gut.

The boys were looking at each other, fear stark on their faces. Obie’s hand crept into Eli’s. The little boy’s whole body shook, those skinny legs of his suspended in the air trembling.

Reed’s memory banks tried to open again and he shoved them shut. “Eli, Obie—”

“We can’t be around our dad,” the older boy said. “He—”

“Then I’ll make sure nothing happens to you.” The words tumbled out of Reed’s mouth, a promise he’d made once before. “Nobody and nothing is going to hurt you. Ever.”

He’d vowed that exact thing too, once upon a time.

And failed miserably in making it come true.

The next morning, Reed approached Bella Bridal, a special occasion clothing boutique housed in an old Craftsman home not far from his neighborhood. The place was owned by the Alessio family, and Alexa Alessio worked her side business out of the same building. She designed wedding and new-baby-on-the-way websites. He’d called Cilla that morning, looking for a meet-up, and she’d told him to rendezvous with her at this location.

He’d considered it a stroke of good luck, because Alexa had been the next on his call list. Yesterday he’d made a rash promise to Obie and Eli, a promise that could get him too involved with Cleo and her boys. He was no good with that complicated of a relationship. Everyone knew him to be remote, detached, unable to connect on a deep emotional level. So during the night, he’d struck upon the idea that the two woman could take over the mission he’d set for himself.

With Cilla and Alexa on the job, he could go back to the business of being the lone wolf writer.

As he turned up the walkway, two familiar figures exited the shop. Ren Colson, second-oldest of the Lemon kids, and a band tour manager that had added a new base of operations to his London headquarters. Now that he was engaged to Cilla, he was running a second arm of his company out of L.A. Bing Maddox, one of Cilla’s twin brothers, was at his side. They were both big, dark-haired men, wearing identical smug expressions.

“Well, well, well.” Crossing his arms over his chest, Reed looked them up and down. “You two have a successful fitting? How do you look in your wedding veils? I’ll bet it’s adorable.”

Ren punched him in the shoulder then shook his hand. Glancing up at the clear sky, he grimaced. “Don’t we have to hustle you out of the sun? I heard it burns you vampires to a crisp.”

“We can’t take him into the shop,” Bing said, greeting him with another handshake. “There’s manicotti leftovers in the kitchen fridge. He’ll be warded off by all that garlic the Alessios use in their cooking.”

“I’m going to brave it anyway,” Reed said. “Your fiancées have a date with me. I guess they’re looking for the companionship of a real man after a few months of playing hide-the-salami with you pipsqueaks.”

“You hold his arms,” Ren told Bing. “I’ll slug him in the gut.”

Then they all stood there grinning at each other, the insult-quotient satisfied.

After a moment, Ren pulled keys from his pocket. “Wouldn’t you rather go out to breakfast with us? Omelets and home fries. Bing claims to know the best place.”

“Maybe another time,” Reed said, unsurprised by the invitation. The previous spring, the death of Guinevere Moon, their fathers’ long-standing groupie, had brought Ren back to the States. One glance at Cilla, now grown up, had decided his fate. And the two of them had determined to bring the Rock Royalty back together.

Though they’d grown up on the same compound, as each came of age they’d escaped the property, a childhood of both too much and too little easy to leave behind. But reuniting went more smoothly than Reed had expected, thanks to the enthusiasm of Cilla and Ren’s dedication to making her happy. With the Velvet Lemons gone on a years-long world tour, Cilla coaxed some of the Rock Royalty and harangued others to often meet together at the compound, declaring they should establish new memories there and work to establish a type of tribal bond.

The progeny of the Velvet Lemons had not been especially close as children and their connections had severed even further as adults, but even Reed was enjoying their renewed interaction more than he’d ever anticipated—and not just because Payne shared his little black book.

“Rain check?” he asked the two other men now.

Ren clapped him on the same shoulder he’d fake-punched just minutes before. “Any time, you know that.”

They left to ingest their heart attacks and Reed continued toward the entry door. It rang as he pushed it open. At the sight in front of him, he nearly bolted.

Dresses, in lace and tissue-thin fabric. A dozen whites, a hundred shades of pastels. They were hung on racks, dressed on dummies, displayed like museum pieces under special lighting. The smell was exotic too, flowers and powder with a counterpoint note of good coffee. A hint of chamomile said tea was available as well.

Women were here and there, he could see them in the main space and in a couple of alcoves. One came down a hallway, a smile on her face. He recognized her as Alexa’s mother.

“Reed!” Patricia Alessio extended her hands toward him, taking his in hers as he bent to kiss her cheek. He’d met her not long after her daughter had agreed to become Bing’s wife. The extended Alessio family was a warm, welcoming, and very large clan that had adopted the Rock Royalty en masse.

They and their generosity had figured into his plan to fulfill his promise to Cleo’s boys.

“I heard you were coming by this morning,” Patricia said. “Can I get you a coffee?”

“No, thanks. I just want to have a short chat with Lex and Cilla.”

“Cilla’s looking over a design of my mother’s and should be finished in a few minutes.” She drew him over to some feminine chairs set around a glass-topped table that held a plate of cookies and a selection of bridal magazines. “Sit down. Alexa will be along shortly too. She’s with a client right now.”

“Sure,” Reed said, gingerly taking a seat on the striped satin cushion. “And you go on and do what’s needed. I can entertain myself until they’re free.”

“Such a good boy,” she said, beaming. Then she patted his cheek and went on her way.

Leaning back in the chair, he stretched out his legs and tried not to feel completely out of place.
Consider it a research trip of sorts
, he told himself. Though when Jesse and the rest of the regulars from his books would have occasion to visit such a boutique, even Reed couldn’t imagine.

A little girl wandered into the room, a doll’s bare ankles in one fist, its long blond hair trailing on the carpet. She stopped short when she saw Reed, and she blinked at him, her lashes almost as long as his pinkie finger. Her dark curls and golden complexion caused him to assume she was one of the Alessio cousins. As a matter of fact, he thought he recognized her from a recent barbecue in Patricia and her husband Art’s back yard.

As she continued to stare at him, he shifted restlessly in his seat. Was it that weird to see a man in the environs?

Then she moved again, this time coming straight for Reed. Without a word, she handed him the doll.

He looked at it. The plastic features were dirty and she was wearing a shift made of a scrap of fabric that had been inexpertly stitched…perhaps by the child herself. Was it safe for someone so small to hold a needle? She couldn’t be more than three, he decided.