Shoe Addicts Anonymous (15 page)

And looking at her gorgeous auburn hair, with a cut so perfect that no matter which way she turned it fell in flattering layers, who wouldn’t take the chance to go to the same stylist?

If Lorna hadn’t just committed more than a hundred and fifty bucks to a pair of boots—she was beginning to have a little buyer’s remorse on that one, and was hoping
Shoegarpie
had outbid her while she wasn’t online—she would have made an appointment herself.

After a quarter of an hour or so, there was a knock at the door. Everyone looked to Lorna.

“I forgot to mention we have someone new coming tonight,” she said. “Jocelyn.”

“I hope she stays longer than last week’s addition,” Helene said, then explained to Sandra about the man/woman who had taken one look in the open door and had fled wordlessly. “We attract some weirdos,” she concluded. “I mean, apparently
we’re
weirdos, but that attracts even scarier weirdos.”

Fortunately, that didn’t appear to be the case this week, Lorna thought as she opened the door to a young woman with the fresh-scrubbed shiny-brunette good looks of the All-American Girl Next Door.

“Hi,” the girl said, her looks made all the more charming by a slightly crooked smile. “I’m Joss Bowen.” She held up a Pier 1 shopping bag. “I’m here for the shoe addiction thing?…” She followed Lorna’s gaze to the bag and quickly added, “Don’t worry, they’re not made of wicker. This was the only bag I could find.”

They both laughed, and Lorna, remembering her manners just a little late, stepped back and ushered her in, making introductions and explaining Sandra’s hair issue so that Sandra didn’t have to tell the story again.

Despite the fact that she was about ten years younger than the others, Joss fit right in, and they passed the evening gabbing away about their lives, loves, and jobs. Joss worked as a nanny for the Oliver family. Lorna had bought a car at Oliver Ford once—before they’d gone highfalutin and started selling only German “motorcars”—and had been so disgusted with the high-pressure salesman and total lack of support when she had mechanical problems that the very name
Oliver
made her shudder. She wasn’t surprised to learn that the Olivers themselves were as obnoxious as their sales staff.

“Why don’t you quit?” Lorna asked, though it had to be admitted that was pretty much her solution to any and all work woes. That was why she was working at Jico instead of, say, an office where she could use the English degree she’d gotten from the University of Maryland. “I bet there are hundreds of people in this area looking for a good nanny.”

“I’ve got a contract,” Joss said, the weight of her signature on that contract clear in her eyes.

“Break it!” Okay, so maybe Lorna wasn’t the best one to be dispensing work advice. It was better, only a little, than her giving financial advice, but it was still inappropriate.

Fortunately, clearer heads prevailed, in the form of Sandra and Helene.

“How much longer do you have on your contract?” Sandra asked.

“Nine months. Four days.” Joss smiled. “And about three and a half hours.”

“Have you shown the contract to a lawyer?” Helene asked. “Perhaps see if there’s a loophole that could get you out? I’m guessing cleaning and grocery shopping, and working after hours aren’t in your job description, so that might be your ticket right there.”

Joss looked hopeful for a moment, then shook her head. “I can’t break a contract. If I did, who’d want to hire me? The Olivers would trash me, they’d make sure no one would even give me an interview.”

“Then you must
at least
make sure you get out at every opportunity so she can’t snag you into doing her bidding for her,” Lorna insisted.

“I agree,” Sandra said.

“Maybe we can go shopping—” Lorna stopped herself midsentence. Shopping was not in her immediate future. But what social thing could she propose that didn’t cost money? Bridge? Power walking?

Get real.

“—or something,” she finished, in a voice somewhat weaker than the one she’d begun with.

By the end of the evening, Lorna had scored a pair of gold Holly-would Marilyn sandals and some Jil Sander open-toe black heels, and was definitely feeling guilt about having bid so much on the boots on eBay. She turned on her computer, hoping to see
Shoegarpie
had swooped in and gotten herself a
(1)
for already having purchased and paid for the boots.

It didn’t happen. As soon as her reluctant fingers signed her in, she saw the boots listed under
ITEMS I’VE WON
. $153.03. Plus shipping, which she hadn’t even thought of. That added another fifteen bucks to the grand total.

Shit.

Shit shit shit.

She clicked on the picture again. They
were
nice. Really nice. And they’d go with just about anything. As soon as winter came around, she’d be damn glad to have them.

Feeling bolstered, she reviewed the auction information to find an address to send the payment. She was all ready to write a personal check when she noticed the seller would take only a cashier’s check or money order.

The next morning she went to the bank to get the money order. Thankfully, Holden Bennington the Pretentious Third was nowhere in sight, and when she got up to the teller’s window, she thought she was home free.

But when the teller clicked into her account, he got a strange, sort of
uh-oh
look on his face, and said he needed to get his manager.

Lorna could barely sputter an objection before he was gone. For one wild moment, she considered running, and when the teller returned with Holden, she wished she had.

“Ms. Rafferty.”

“Mr. Bennington.”

“How about coming back to my office?”

The temptation to refuse was overwhelming, but what could she do? She
had
to pay for the boots. “Such personal service,” she commented, and followed him back to what was rapidly becoming a familiar walk through the bank.

“A hundred and sixty-eight dollars and three cents,” he said, gesturing for her to sit in what they would both no doubt be coming to think of as
her
seat.

“That’s right.”

“Your bank balance is currently two hundred twenty dollars and forty-nine cents—”

She splayed her arms in a broad shrug. “Sounds like a go to me.”

“Except you’ve gotten approval for—” He clicked into the computer, and Lorna resisted the urge to suggest he simply put her account on his
favorite places
list. “—two hundred and four dollars and sixteen cents.” He looked at her. “One of which was a dollar preapproval at the gas station for what was probably more than a dollar’s worth of gas. So I’m guessing that takes us back into the red.”

Lorna swallowed. She did
not
like living this way. And she could get snarky with Holden, but what would be the point? She needed the guy in charge of her bank account to be on her side, not against her.

“Look,” she said. “I’m working on this. And I won’t lie, it’s been a struggle. I’m sure you can see that.” She gestured toward his computer monitor. “But I really need to get this cashier’s check today.”

“I can’t just give you money you don’t have.”

“Well, you
could
.” She smiled. “Isn’t that what banks do?”

To her surprise, he smiled back.

And to her even greater surprise, she thought he looked sort of cute when he smiled.

He worked more on the computer, looking like he was really wrestling with the problem, but then said to her, “I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do.”

She wondered what the penalty was for being an eBay deadbeat. She’d probably be banned. No sooner had she found this wonderful bit of heaven, where she could buy designer shoes at discount store prices than she’d have to give it up forever.

Then she remembered the tip money in her purse. “Oh! Wait!” She dug through her bag while Holden waited silently on the other side of the desk. Then she found what she was looking for: an untidy wad of money she hadn’t even counted yet. “I need to make a deposit.”

She counted it out—$204, sixty dollars of which were ones—and handed it over to Holden.

“I can get that cashier’s check now, can’t I?” she asked.

He looked pained. “Yes. Though I’m inclined to advise against it.”

“Yeah, well, duly noted. But you can cut the check, right?”

He sighed, looked her dead in the eye—she hadn’t noticed the unusual greenish blue of his eyes before—then nodded. “I know this is going to come back to haunt me,” he said. “But legally, I can’t refuse.”

She gave a quick smile. “Buck up, Bennington. It will be fine. Honestly.”

I
can’t help myself…. I love you and nobody else….”
Sandra wasn’t usually one to bounce out of bed in the morning, but today she was in an excellent mood, singing the song she suddenly couldn’t get out of her head. Mike had called while she was at Lorna’s last night and left a message asking if she wanted to go to Cosmos tonight for karaoke night.

She would never, ever get up in front of people and
breathe,
much less sing, but she was glad to go and have some martinis with Mike. Hell, she’d be glad to go and do just about
anything
with Mike.

How had she managed to go all these years without giving him a thought? And, more to the point, how lucky was she that he’d turned up in her life just when she needed it most.

“
…no matter how I try, my love I cannot hide…”
She booted her computer and danced around the room to get the phone and call Mike back. She got his voice mail and left a message. Then she called Helene’s stylist. The soonest appointment she could get was in a month. She toyed with the idea of asking for someone else, but the green hair had sort of brought her luck. If she’d just been blending into the woodwork as usual, maybe Mike would never have noticed her that night.

Besides, he liked it.

So…okay. She’d keep it a little longer. Why not? It wasn’t like she looked in the mirror a lot and had to face it.

She sat down at the computer and started clicking around. She had her routine. E-mail, Zappos, Poundy.com, Washingtonpost.com, eBay, and usually at least two or three Google searches on whatever might have caught her curiosity the night before.

Lately she’d been Googling Mike Lemmington a lot. He’d gotten some academic achievements in college that were still listed on the site, and a brief bio, along with a tiny picture, was posted on his advertising company’s Web site. She’d looked at that picture a lot. If she hadn’t been so afraid that he’d end up seeing it sitting out somewhere, she would have printed it out.

She completed her routine, then did the thing she always saved for last on Wednesdays—she went to the bathroom, peed, stripped off every shred of clothing, including any hair accessories, and got on the scale. She had to do it once a week, and she chose Wednesday because it gave her a reasonable amount of time to recover from the possibility of a fattening weekend. (Lonely Friday and Saturday nights often resulted in the consumption of empty calories.)

She took a breath and stepped onto the scale. She hated seeing the number. Especially since lately it hadn’t gone down much, if at all. Two weeks ago, she’d actually been up half a pound, and last week she hadn’t been able to stand the idea of getting on at all.

This week was different, though. She was happy. Excited.
Optimistic
. Jeez, when was the last time she could have said that? So she stood on the scale and waited for the numbers to settle.

She was down four pounds.

Four!
She got off the scale, let it reset, and got on again. Same result. Down four pounds.

She couldn’t believe it. She knew she hadn’t been thinking about food so much, but this? This was a surprise.

She put her clothes back on and eyed the scale again, almost confident enough to get on it fully clothed.

But that was going too far. She slid the scale back under the sink and promised herself to keep up the good work and not get on again until next week.

With everything in order, and ready for tonight, Sandra went to work. She called the central number and logged in, then waited for the first call while watching a morning talk show, where two women were duking it out over a tall thin guy with a tuft of pale peach fuzz on his chin.

It didn’t take long for the first call to come in.

“Penelope,” he said, his voice thick and slurred. “Pen…el…o…
peeeee.
You got me hot, babe.”

“Hey, baby,” she cooed. “Who are you?”

“Jis’ call me Long Dong Silver….” He laughed at his own joke for a good long time. At least a buck fifty’s worth. “Ge’ it? Long dong…” He laughed again.

Excellent. With any luck, this would be a case of whiskey dick that would take a good long time to satisfy. She could use the money to buy Mike some shoes. He was woefully undereducated and undersupplied in that department.

She giggled for him. “You’re funny!”

“Aw, man, I gottamillion of ’em.”

He proceeded to give her a litany of crude puns, one after the other, as the dollars on his phone bill racked up into the tens, the twenties…Finally he stopped and said, “You spose’ be talkin’ to
me
. Get me hot, babe. I wanna feel ya. Talk to me, Pen-el-o-
pee
…”

Sandra leaned back on the sofa, put her feet up on the coffee table, and said, “I’m wearing black patent leather hip boots….”

It was a good day. A
very
good day. She didn’t know what it was about this particular Wednesday that had so many men going hot and heavy, but when three o’clock rolled around, she’d logged a good solid six hours. More than enough to go to Ormond’s and get that pair of pale suede Hogans she thought would be just perfect for Mike. Not so casual that they looked cheap, yet not formal at all, the Hogans were the perfect, elegant choice.

When she got to the shoe department, it was, of course, Luis who was working there. She’d never quite forgiven him for the icy, condescending way he’d treated her when she’d first encountered him. As if he’d looked at her and instantly decided she must be looking for the thrift store down the street instead.

Their exchange, and her resulting purchase, had apparently made her more memorable to him, because when he saw her he raised his eyebrows and addressed her by name, “Ms. Vanderslice. It’s been such a long time since we’ve seen you! But it’s always a pleasure,” he hastened to add.

Not always, she remembered.

“I’m looking for a pair of Hogans for my boyfriend,” she said. Though she’d only used the term
boyfriend
because it was shorter than saying
this guy I’m seeing and hoping to develop a relationship with,
but she liked the sound of it nevertheless.

Boyfriend. She’d never really had a boyfriend, so some part of her was still stuck in a fifth-grade mentality, trying on “grown-up words” to see how they felt.

“Hogans,” he said, and a light went into his eye. “Good choice. I, myself, am partial to them. Tell me, what size does your boyfriend wear?” Something about the way he asked it made her think he was skeptical of the relationship, but that could have been her imagination.

“He wears a nine.” Under the guise of using the bathroom, she’d checked out his closet when they’d gone by his place on the way to Stetson’s one night.

Luis snapped his fingers and pointed at her. “You know, we just got some Zenders in as well. I think you might like them even more than the Hogans. Take a seat, and I’ll go get you some to choose from.”

“Thanks.” She sat down and was startled when he asked, “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

She shook her head. “No, thanks.”

“Tea? Anything?”

Truth be told, she really resented his overly solicitous approach to her now, but she wasn’t going to confront him about it. Instead she just tried to act like she was above it all. “Nothing, thanks.”

He hurried off and was back within a couple of minutes with five boxes. He set the boxes down and removed the tops, telling Sandra, “The Zenders are about a hundred dollars more than the Hogans, but who can put a price on style, am I right?”

Sandra smiled politely.

He set the shoes up expertly, showing them off to their greatest advantage. “The color of these Bruno Maglis, I’m sure you’ll agree, is just magnificent.” He set down a pair in a deep, rich burgundy.

She had to admit, they were nice. But too formal. “My friend—my boyfriend, that is, does a lot of walking in his job, and I think those are just too formal. I like the Hogans because they’re such comfortable walking shoes.”

“Absolutely.” Luis moved the boxes around so the Hogans were closest to Sandra. He was also careful to make sure it was the more expensive pair that was in front. “What does he do? Your boyfriend, I mean.”

“He’s in real estate.”

Luis nodded without real interest. “These are perfect for any discerning man.” He nudged the pricier pair toward her.

She deliberately picked up the less expensive pair. Actually, she liked them better anyway.

“Luis!” An older woman Sandra had never seen before came out from the back room. “Javier’s on the phone. Again.”

“Tell him I’ll call him back,” Luis snapped. Then, perhaps realizing his tone, he explained, “We have a policy not to leave customers unattended.”

Sandra thought that was odd. “I think I can fend for myself if you need to take a phone call.”

“No, no.” He gave an exasperated sigh. “It’s a new policy.” Then he added, in confidential tones, “It’s because of what happened with the senator’s wife.”

“I’m sorry, it’s because of what?” She couldn’t even imagine what could have happened with a senator’s wife that prevented Luis from taking a phone call. Had she had some sort of weird accident while no one was here to take care of her? Perhaps she’d been attacked by a pair of alligator pumps?

“I’m not supposed to talk about it,” Luis said, in the voice of one who had already talked about
it,
whatever it was, repeatedly. And who had no intention to stop talking about it. “But I can trust
you,
I’m sure.”

Sandra’s life was already so uncomfortably full of men’s secrets, that the words
I can trust you, I’m sure
made her instantly aware that he was about to say something she probably didn’t want to hear. “I wouldn’t want you to get in trouble,” she began. “Honestly, you don’t—”

“She was caught
shoplifting!
” He pressed his lips together and nodded, watching Sandra for a reaction.

“Who was?” Sandra was confused. Had she missed something? Surely Luis wasn’t saying that some senator’s wife—

“The senator’s wife,” Luis said in a stage whisper. His glee was evident. “Helene Zaharis.”

The party was excruciating.

Of course, most of these political fund-raisers were, but this one was at the home of the controversial Mornini family—rumored to be involved in organized crime, though Helene doubted it—which should have spiced things up considerably.

Maybe she was just too tired to appreciate it tonight. Surely she and Jim would be leaving soon. It was already…Helene looked for a clock and found one on the mantel. Eight fifteen? That was
all
?

Good Lord, she was sure it was past eleven.

She tried to shake off some of her exhaustion and headed for the open bar to order her fourth Red Bull of the evening. The caffeine would undoubtedly kick in full steam in a few hours, right about the time she was lying down to sleep.

“Another one,” she said to the bartender, smiling and shaking her head. “Maybe make it a double.”

He gave a charming smile and took out a small can and poured the contents into a short crystal glass.

“Goodness, you look as bored as I feel!”

Helene turned to see Chiara Mornini, the gorgeous, petite,
young
Italian wife of patriarch—and septuagenarian—Anthony. They’d never met, but Chiara’s picture regularly showed up in the
Washington Post
“Style” section, and the
Washingtonian
magazine.

“Chiara Mornini,” Chiara said, holding out a manicured hand.

“Helene Zaharis,” Helene said, and thought she noticed something flicker across Chiara’s expression. She could only hope it wasn’t that she disliked Jim’s politics. “I apologize if I look bored, I’m really just tired.” Usually her game face was better than this.

“Oh, honey, this is
boring,
” Chiara said with a laugh. “We just do what we have to do, for the men.” She gave a trill of laughter.

“It pays the bills,” Helene joked, then took a step and stumbled slightly. A mistake. That was far too indiscreet. She needed to get some coffee before she embarrassed herself and, heaven forbid, Jim.

But Chiara didn’t look like she cared one whit. In fact, Helene’s stumble only served to call Chiara’s attention to her feet. “My goodness, are those Stuart Weitzman?”

Helene looked at her in some surprise. “Yes. Good call.”

“Oh, I
love
him! I nearly talked Anthony into buying me his diamond-encrusted Cinderella Slippers, but he felt two million was too much for a pair of shoes.” She sighed. “He’d drop it on a necklace but not shoes. I couldn’t convince him it was the same thing, even though Alison Krauss wore them at the
Oscars,
for heaven’s sake.”

Even Helene would have a hard time rationalizing that, but she was in awe of Chiara’s attitude. “I can’t see my husband going for that either.”

“They just don’t understand, do they?”

Oh, there was so much Jim didn’t understand. “No,” Helene said simply.

“So…you’re a shoe person?” Chiara asked.

Helene laughed. “You might say I’m an addict.”

Chiara smiled. “I knew it! I could tell we had something in com mon as soon as we met. Quite a few things, I’ll bet. As a matter of fact,” Chiara paused a moment, then whispered, “come upstairs with me for a moment. I have something I want to show you.”

Helene glanced uncertainly in Jim’s direction.

“Oh, yes, of course he’ll be mad. Anthony as well. Forget them.” Chiara took Helene by the arm in instant camraderie. “If they want us to stick around, next time they better invite some pretty young boys for us to look at.”

Helene liked this woman.

They went upstairs, through a gilded hallway more ornate than anything Helene had seen outside of a church, and Chiara led her through a red room with a massive round bed with red satin sheets, to what appeared to be a large empty room lined with doors.