Dust by Eva Everson (epub e reader .TXT) 📕

“Not a problem, Mrs. Morgan,” he told her. Because, sweet as he could be, this wasn’t about his kindness. Home delivery was something Miss Justine prided herself in, reminding those who worked for her that if their customers were sick enough to need a prescription, they surely didn’t need to be out and about, getting worse while spreading their germs. “We’ll have it over there to you in about a half hour and we’ll bill you first of the month.”

“Thank you, again,” she said, then hung up.

Westley smiled. Morgan. The last name made him think of the author of that book Ali was reading. The one she didn’t know he knew about. The one she’d slid between the sofa cushions and he’d found one evening while she bathed Michelle. He’d flipped through it. Saw that the first part of it instructed women on being organized. Apparently, his lovely bride had skipped most of that part and headed straight to parts two and three, which were about adoring your husband and having playful sex with him. Westley shook his head as he flipped the pages and chuckled—Allison Houser could have written that part of the book.

He glanced at the clock again; he was even more ready to go home.

He pulled into the driveway a little after five thirty. Spied his wife’s face peering around the front window draperies. Wondered if she was going to meet him at the door wearing something crazy like the Morgan woman wrote about in her book. Decided he really didn’t care if she did or she didn’t. Besides, he had a surprise for her.

She opened the door before he reached the front porch. She wasn’t wearing pink baby doll pajamas and go-go boots, but she looked stunning in a moss-green, one-piece jumpsuit that hugged all the places it should and flowed around the rest. Instead of the typical ponytail she’d found easier with a near-two-year-old, she wore her hair down. It lay upon her bare, tanned shoulders in thick waves. “Wow,” he said, stopping.

Ali turned, slowly, allowing him to admire her in the way a husband should. And he did. God knew he did more than he could have ever imagined he would. “Wow,” he said again. “If I’d known this was waiting for me, I would have clocked out sooner.”

She giggled. “Come in before the mosquitos do.”

Westley crossed the threshold and stopped again, breathing in the scent of lemony furniture polish and a collection of vanilla-scented candles in various heights that flickered on the dining room table. He scratched his head, teasing. “Am I in the right house?”

His wife slid her arms around his shoulder and kissed him soundly. Passionately. “Don’t get too excited,” she said, and he wondered exactly what she meant. About the house or over her?

Westley grabbed her waist and squeezed. “Too late,” he muttered.

Ali leaned back. “And don’t get any funny ideas,” she said. “Dinner is ready.”

He pulled her back to him. Nuzzled at her ear. “What are we having?”

“Your favorite—glazed pineapple chops with scalloped potatoes and green beans.”

He looked at her. Raised a brow. “Ro-Bay has been here, hasn’t she?”

She pouted, playfully. “All right, you found me out. She cleaned while I cooked.”

Westley kissed the tip of her nose. “Does that mean I get to cuddle with Ro-Bay, too?”

She snuggled up close. “I better be the only woman you ever cuddle up to, Westley Houser.”

This time he kissed her, kissed her with as much passion as she had him. “I promise,” he told her. “You’re the only one for me.”

And he meant it.

Allison

“I love you,” I whispered.

Westley lay on the sofa with me up against him. Our dinner had been eaten—the dishes left on the table, the kitchen back to its old messy state—and the candles glowed from the next room. Only moments before, while Westley adjusted the sofa’s pillows and stretched along the full length of the old couch, I dropped The Carpenters: A Song for You—my old go-to album—onto the turntable of our stereo, then turned the volume high enough that the music filled the room, but low enough that we could talk. Now, as Karen Carpenter’s throaty and soothing voice cooed into a microphone, I did the same along the lobe of my husband’s ear. “I love you so much,” I said.

He brushed my hair from my shoulder, the teasing of his fingertips sending chills down my arms. Up my legs. “You know you’re the only girl for me, right?” he asked.

I nodded, wondering what made him say such a thing. He’d seen Cindie that morning. Handed their child over to her. Had she come on to him? Had he been intrigued by her? I’d only seen her in those veiled moments as she drove up and down our street all those months ago, so she seemed a mere shadow to me. A shadow that hovered over our house and sometimes crept into our rooms.

“We have a good life here, don’t we, Ali?”

I nodded again, trying to squash the molecules of trepidation that requested a ride on the coattails of my gooseflesh.

“You, me, and Michelle?”

Yes. Him, me, and Michelle. But not Cindie. Oh, thank God, not Cindie. The last person in the world I wanted in the mix of the news I’d waited nearly two days to share with my husband was her. It was enough that I had to deal with the shadow … enough that I looked at Michelle and wondered what part of her mother rested in her face … curled her hair … determined her mannerisms. I nodded, closing my eyes for a moment to gain control. Knowing I could not let Cindie Campbell be a part of this evening, not even in the slightest of ways. “What if …” I began, then laid my cheek against his shoulder and inhaled the honied muskiness of what was left of his cologne. “What if it could be even better than that?”

Westley pressed his lips against my forehead.