Gunning For Angels (Fallen Angels Book 1) (9 page)

How can a woman be expected to be happy with a man who insists on treating her as if she were perfectly normal human being.

–Oscar Wilde

“What kind of father makes his son sleep on the floor?” Chip exclaimed as he tried to get comfortable in the sleeping bag that was stretched across the hardwood floor of what used to be his bedroom.

“A father who’s married to a mother who doesn’t want you to get too comfortable!” Bunnie snapped, appeared in the doorway. Bud felt a pang of regret at letting Bunnie talk him into removing the bed frame and mattress from Chip’s bedroom and making him sleep on his musty-smelling sleeping bag from his Boy Scout years. 

“This is cruel and unusual punishment,” Chip grumbled.

“Being a mother is cruel and unusual punishment.” Bunnie grabbed the pillow from under Chip’s head.

“What the…!” Chip looked up incredulously.

Bunnie snatched a textbook off a nearby shelf and handed it
to him, “Try that for a pillow. Maybe some big words will seep in and you’ll come to your senses.”

“I’m not going back.”

“I know, I know,” Bunnie said sarcastically, “You’re going to go a-soul-searching and ‘find yourself’ and write the next great American novel. Just what the world needs – another bum writer.”

“Everyone’s hungry for a good story,” Chip argued.

“Everyone’s hungry to be distracted from their impending doom but you don’t see me stripping buck naked and dancing a jig in the street. Being a writer – it’s a pipe dream! You need to grow up and focus on a real career – like being a doctor.”

“I’d rather be happy chasing a pipe dream.”

“Yeah, forget about becoming a rich doctor with a gorgeous wife. Who needs that?”

“I don’t know if you noticed this, mom, but doctors aren’t so rich anymore.”

“Finish school, become a doctor and
then
– if you want to be an
artiste –
I won’t so much as peep.”

“The day you ‘don’t so much as peep’ is the day you start pushing up dandelions, mom.”

“You’re throwing your life away! I won’t stand by and help you flush three years of hard work down the toilet.” Bunnie threw her hands up dramatically. “As God as my witness, Chip, twenty years from now you are going to wake up a broken man and you are going to
bitterly
regret this decision.”

“I don’t expect you to support my decision but I do expect you to accept it.” Chip turned to Bud, “Can I shadow you tomorrow? I need to start research for the novel – it’s a detective thriller.”

Bunnie compressed her lips into a thin, white line.

Bud took Bunnie gently by the arm, “Come on, Bunn, let’s leave Chip to his…”

“Hardwood floor. What’s for breakfast? Gruel?” Chip adjusted the book under his head. “If I wake up with a neck crick…”

“You’ll have to go to
a doctor
. Someone who actually made his mother proud.”

“You act like it’s the end of the world.” Chip said. “I’m not going back and you are just going to have to deal with it.”

Bunnie took a menacing step toward Chip. “It’s not for nothin’ I been married to a homicide detective for forty years. I brought you in this world and I can take you out – and nobody will be any the wiser.”

“Bunnie…” Bud admonished.

“Don’t you ‘Bunnie’ me!” She turned on Bud furiously. “I want a doctor-son! These bunions aren’t going to fix themselves!”

“A
podiatrist
fixes bunions,” Chip said. “I didn’t go to med school to be a bunion-fixing podiatrist.”

“No,” Bunnie snapped, “You’re a live-at-home dropout sleeping on a floor other people paid for. Finis
h school and get your own floor.”

“You’ll get over it,” Chip said wryly.

Bunnie sprang for Chip but Bud grabbed her around the waist. He dragged her out of the room as she yelled, “Get over it? I’ll tell you what I need to get over! The ulcer in my stomach that you could drive a truck through!”

Bud slammed the door behind them.

Bunnie grabbed Bud’s shirt, tears in her eyes, “He’s going to ruin his life!”

Bud touched her on the cheek, smiling tenderly. “Like you ruined your life when you married me.”

Scowling, Bunnie pushed him away. “That was different.”

Bud steered her toward their bedroom at the end of the hall. “Your dad hated me.”

“He didn’t hate you.”

“He told me he had a chainsaw in the garage and he knew how to use it.”

“He was a tad overprotective.”

“Before he walked you up the aisle, he told you he had a car waiting if you wanted to change your mind.”

“Family tradition. It wouldn’t be a proper wedding if the escape car wasn’t at least offered.” In the bedroom, Bunnie peeled off her clothes and tossed them haphazardly on the floor. Bud stripped down to his boxers and neatly folded his clothes before dropping them into the hamper. “Dad hated all the boys we brought home. He liked you in the end, didn’t he?”

“I don’t think him saying on his deathbed that ‘maybe he’s not so bad’ constitutes him liking me.”

Bunnie smiled wistfully. “I miss him.”

“I do too.”

Bunnie kicked her clothes across the floor into a walk-in closet. She pulled on a silky nightgown and jerked a brush through her hair. 

Bud watched her, eyes glowing in admiration. “Why are you so darned pretty?”  

Bunnie softened. “We sure made a pretty baby, didn’t we?”

Bud reached out to put his arms around Bunnie’s waist but she pushed him away. “Are you going to retire?”

“Stop being so –
angry
.”

“I
am
angry! I want to sell the house, right out from under that boy’s butt. I want
us
to retire and live on a cruise ship.”

“We can’t afford that,
” Bud said, laughing.

“Cheaper than an old person’s home.”

“I don’t think we’re ready for an old person’s home just yet.”

“Have you looked in the mirror lately? You’re not exactly a spring chicken.”

Bud said, “I’ve seen it a thousand times. A man retires – he loses his edge, gets old and
dies.
Work is what keeps me young. It gives me purpose. ”

“I can’t take this, Bud.”

“What’s changed? We’ve been doing this for years. You’ve been happy.”

“I’m not happy anymore.”

“Seems to me you’re trying hard
not
to be happy.” 

“I want something different,” Bunnie said resolutely.

Bud stared at Bunnie, realization sweeping over him. 

If she’s talking about leaving, she’s already gone.

Bud stared at her in astonishment. “You’re not serious?”

“It’s not you,” Bunnie whispered. “There’s no one else.”

Bud’s mouth fell open.

Bunnie said,
“You can sleep in the guest room. I’ll give you to the end of the week to make up your mind. It’s either retirement with
me...
” Bunnie’s voice trailed off.

“Bunn…”

“Don’t call me Bunn!” She screamed, shoving him into the hallway.

Bud stood dazed, staring at the locked door.

A wounded deer leaps the highest.

–Emily Dickinson

Enid sat on the couch, arms tightly crossed as she surveyed Jack with hostile eyes. Cheryl had deposited her and Jack in the living room and discreetly moved the rest of the family elsewhere. Jack nervously tapped his fingers and looked as comfortable as a condemned man. After several aborted attempts at conversation, he’d given up.

Silence hung between them like a heavy stone. 

“If your sister killed somebody – would you cover for her?” Jack asked suddenly.

Enid stared at him like he’d lost his marbles.

“Well?” Jack said.

Enid scowled, wondering what game he was playing. She couldn’t shake the image of him picking her mother’s vomit out of his carpet on the night
she
was conceived.

I won’t let him get the upper hand!

She forced herself to answer between clenched teeth. “Murder, self-defense or revenge?”

“Your sister calls you at two in the morning and says she’s got a dead man on her hands and she killed him. What do you do?”

“I don’t have a sister,” Enid snapped.

“Hypothetically.”

Enid scowled, pushing down the desire to punch the calm expression off his face. “Depends on who she killed. Depends on
which
sister.”

“I thought you didn’t have a sister?”

Enid banged her fist on the couch, yelling, “You said hypothetically! And
hypothetically,
I have a normal family instead of the weirdo show that seems to be my biological parents!”

Cheryl appeared in the doorway, dishcloth in hand. “Everything okay?”

Enid felt a stab of pleasure at seeing Jack’s face flush red.

“Just getting to
know each other,” Jack said grimly. 

Cheryl smiled at Enid. “I’ll be in here if you need me.” She disappeared into the kitchen. 

After a long silence, Jack said, “I’m working a case. I thought you might have some insight.”

Enid curled her lip in disgust. “Yeah, right.”

“Okay.” Jack took a deep breath and began again,  “What’s the first thing you think when you hear that a daughter hates her stepfather?”

Enid shifted uncomfortably.

“Well?” Jack asked patiently.

“This is dumb.”

“Look, we can talk about anything you want. Start a conversation; I’m all ears.” Jack’s eyes glinted shrewdly. “In the meantime, your Aunt Cheryl suggested we talk about –
our feelings
.”

Enid’s eyes widened in alarm and, scared that her Aunt was going to pop out and force her to talk about how she
felt
, she forced herself to answer civilly. “Duh. Step-Monster is beating her, beating mom or…” Enid felt her face flush red in embarrassment and the thought of saying what she was really thinking.

“It’s a stereotype, but that’s what I was thinking.” 

“Gross,” Enid muttered.

“Ducks and zebras.”

Enid looked at him, puzzled. Was this guy for real? Or was he messing with her? She suddenly felt an inkling of curiosity to see where he was going with this.  

“When it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck…”

“Don’t go looking for zebras,” Enid finished. “Who’d my hypothetical sister kill?”

“Probably somebody who had it coming.”

Enid bit her lip. “Do you usually catch the bad guy?”

“Sometimes.”

Enid thought about this. After a few moments, she said, “I guess you never know what you’ll do – until you’re there.”

“I heard you did your own research and found me. Is that how you found out about me?”

Enid remembered her mother screaming at Henry from the driveway. “I was tipped off.”

“How’d you do it?”

“What’s it to you? You don’t care.”

“I’m more than willing to start a conversation about our
feelings
.” Jack answered with knowing glimmer in his eyes.

Enid examined his face. She didn’t like the smug look in his eyes. Not one bit. After a moment, she smiled sweetly, “Okay.”

It was Jack’s turn to look alarmed.

“I want to talk about my
emotions
,” Enid said with a wicked grin.

Jack made an inarticulate sound and gripped the chair like he’d gotten strapped into a broken roller coaster.  

Enid leaned forward, “Let’s start with how I
feel
about finding out that my mother was a total lush and my biological dad is a…”

Jack jumped up, hands in the air. “You win! I give up!” He shouted toward the kitchen, “Cheryl, I can’t do this!”

Cheryl materialized in the doorway. 

“She hates me,
” Jack pointed at Enid. “I’m not – I can’t…”

Enid stood up in alarm. Was he going to leave?

Jack strode for the door. He shot her an apologetic look. “Sorry, kid…”

Enid watched with mounting alarm as he made his escape. She looked at her Aunt in confusion.

Her Aunt looked at her with eyes full of –
pity
?

A car door slammed. Without thinking, Enid shoved past her Aunt and bounded out the front door. She ran pell-mell toward his car. She yanked the handle and, when he didn’t stop, she slapped her hand on the window and heard herself yelling. In a blur, through her tears, she was shocked to see the expression in his eyes. 

He hates me.

The car jolted to a stop. Enid jumped in and hunched down, too scared to do anything but pretend to be mad.

They sat in silence.

After a long moment, Jack threw the car into reverse and, with shaking hands, Enid snapped on her seat belt. She pulled her hoodie up to hide her face. She hunkered down, not caring where they were headed.