“Why would I care if Mike saw the charge?” This made no sense. “Where’d you pick me up from?”
“Near Fox Hills. Shitty area. I hit a pothole that fucked up my alignment.”
“Why would I be in . . .” I paused as a horrible gear clicked into place. “Was I by the mall?”
He picked up his own coffee cup. “A little more to the west. You were at a gas station, sitting on the curb.” He said it like I’d been bare-assed on a skid row bucket. “Probably ruined your pants. I put them in the wash for you.”
“Thanks.” I squeezed his knee, unsurprised by the gesture. Sam was the ultimate caretaker. He’d probably given me two Tylenol and a glass of ice water before telling me a bedtime story. One day, he’d make a great father, but until then, he was all mine.
My mind detoured around The Ways Sam Was Great, because there was only one likely reason for me to be in Ladera Heights, near the mall, at that exact station that Sam was mentioning—I know that gas station—and it was because Fran lived two blocks inward, in a Pepto-Bismol-pink house with twin plastic flamingos in the yard. I knew because I’d fed her cats for two weeks, a few years ago, when she was in Costa Rica. I knew because once, after feeding those scrawny Siameses, I’d bought cigarettes at that gas station. There, hit with an immense craving for nicotine, I’d convinced myself that one or two cigarettes wouldn’t hurt anybody.
So why had I been there last night? Maybe Fran had called me and wanted to smooth over her employee review with a glass of merlot and those smelly French cheeses that she always gifted the Times editorial staff for Christmas. “Where’s my phone?”
“I left it next to you.” He reached behind me and patted the cushion, then ran his hand down the back crack. It wasn’t there. “Here, I’ll call it.”
I found it just before it rang, the thin case wedged between the arm and the cushion. “Got it.” I unlocked the screen and went to my call log. No missed calls from Mike. What kind of husband wouldn’t notice—or care—if his wife didn’t come home? Or maybe I had come home. After all, I’d had to get to Fran’s somehow. Had Mike given me a ride? I tried desperately to remember something, but came up blank.
Yep, there was my call to Sam, at 11:42 p.m. Before that, nothing. No call from Fran. I checked my texts and discovered the same. “What’d I say when you picked me up?”
He ran a hand across the thigh of his linen pant leg and flicked at a piece of something. He stayed silent, and my concern grew. “Sam?”
“You don’t remember anything about last night?” he finally asked.
“No,” I snapped.
“You were drunk,” he said reluctantly. “And upset. At least, you were upset when we parted. But at the gas station, you seemed . . . satisfied.”
Satisfied? What was that supposed to mean? At my blank look, he sighed. “I should check on your pants. They should be dry by now.”
“Like, sexually satisfied?” I ventured.
He broke out in unexpected laughter, a bout that stretched so long that I glared at him. “It’s not that funny,” I sniped.
“Oh my gosh.” He caught his breath, his laugh wheezing to a halt. “You took what I was saying in the completely wrong context. It’s my fault for trying to beat around the bush. Ignore satisfied. You seemed vindicated. That’s a more accurate word.”
Vindicated. Dread closed like a vise around my stomach. I didn’t like that answer at all. The idea that I was lurking around Fran’s neighborhood at midnight was already an unsettling thought. The thought of me emerging victorious and villainous did not bode well for whatever I’d been up to. “Did I say anything?”
“Well, before you vomited into my messenger bag, I asked what you’d been doing and you smiled.” He shifted uncomfortably, and I stifled the urge to remind him that I was the good girl in our pairing, the one who always told him to slow down when he was driving, and that a homophobic asshole at the bar wasn’t worth arguing with. This drunk, vomiting weirdo he was describing—that wasn’t me. That didn’t sound like anything I would actually do, yet here I was, in my underwear, looking at the record of a phone call that supported that exact action.
“I just smiled?”
“It was this creepy evil grin.” He grimaced. “And then you said that you were ‘righting wrongs.’” He lifted his hands in surrender. “Whatever that means.”
“It doesn’t sound good,” I said dully.
“Well, no offense, Lill, but you’re not exactly a masked vigilante. Worst-case scenario, you probably left a strongly worded Post-it Note on someone’s windshield who parked too close to a fire hydrant.”
I almost smiled at that, the scenario accurate.
He stood. “Look, I’ve got a listing appointment in an hour. Let me grab your pants from the dryer, and I’ll give you a ride to your car.”
I nodded as he headed to the laundry room. Returning to my phone, I opened my email. Any optimism I’d gained disappeared at the latest email in my in-box. It was from Fran, and the subject line was all I needed to see.
Lillian Smith: Termination.
CHAPTER 19
LILLIAN
Fran’s email was short and also sent to an address I didn’t recognize—probably HR—with four CCs, including me.
Lillian Smith is no longer employed with Los Angeles Times Communications LLC, effective immediately. Please disable her database access, key fob, parking card, and company email account.
I was still staring at the screen when Sam returned, my blue capris in hand. In my peripheral vision, I could see them hovering, and reached out and blindly felt around until I found them.
“What’s wrong? You’re super pale.” I felt his hand on my forehead. “Temperature feels normal.”
“I was just fired.”
“What?” He sat next to me and I listed to the left until I hit his shoulder. He put his arm around me and pulled me against his side.
Twenty-two years. Two decades. I’d been with the newspaper longer than I’d been with Mike. It felt like everything in my life was splintering apart. I let out a groan.
“Hey, it’s okay.” Sam smoothed a hand over my hair, then wiped a tear from my cheek.
No, it wasn’t. I was a happily married wife; then I wasn’t. I was a respectfully employed writer; now I wasn’t. What did my life look like without my job? What did I look like?
“You can get another job.” Sam pressed a kiss on the side of my head. “Lillian. Hey. Stop crying.”
Oh God. I was crying. I clamped my lips to stop the small mewing sounds that were bubbling out. I hadn’t been this emotional over Mike’s cheating, and what did that say about my mental state? Sam went to stand and I clung to his shirt, my cheek pressed against his scratchy linen top.
“Just let me call Mike. He’ll come and pick you up.”
“No.” I surfaced from the grief long enough to find my voice. “Don’t tell Mike.”
“Why not?”
“Just, promise me you won’t.” The thought of Mike knowing about this failure . . . Talk about a deep knife in the wound of my already damaged ego. First, I couldn’t keep a husband; now I couldn’t keep a job. “I’ll tell him later, when I’m ready. I need to talk to Fran first. See what’s going on. Maybe she’ll hire me back.” Even part-time, even as a freelancer. Hell, I’d grovel and beg and do sales calls if I had to.