A hell of a lot. She wiped the tears from her eyes angrily, refolding the letter and putting it back in the envelope. Howard had obviously intended to send a letter to both her and Ellen Ronda and had unthinkingly placed the letters in the wrong envelopes.
Ellen was no doubt reading about the lovely time and dinner Howard had had.
She was not usually this emotional, this easily hurt, butdammit , she had been trying to help Howard through a difficult period, and this backhanded backstabbing cut deep. She and Doug had always considered him a friend. Maybe not a close friend, but a friend nonetheless, a man whose company they both enjoyed. Why would he do something like this? And how could he be so two-faced?
He had never been a deceitful or duplicitous man. Outspoken honesty had always been his greatest strength and greatest weakness. He had never hesitated to speak his mind, no matter what the consequences. It would be one thing if he had just come out and said he didn't want to come over for dinner or didn't enjoy their company or didn't like the food they served him, but to sit there and lie to them, to The phone rang. Tritia dropped the letter on the small table, pushed herself out of the butterfly chair, and hurried across the porch into the house.
She caught the phone on the fifth ring, clearing her throat to purge the emotion from her voice. "Hello?"
"He's after me!" The whisper on the other end of the line Was frantic and borderline hysterical, and Tritia did not at first recognize it. "He's here now."
"Excuse me?" Tritia said, puzzled.
"I think he's in the house now," the woman whispered.
Now she recognized the voice. Ellen Ronda. She was shocked at how different Bob's wife sounded. Gone was the cool-as-ice voice Tritia had heard for as long as she could remember; gone, too, was the grief-stricken wildness she'd heard on the day of the funeral. In its place was fear. Terror.
"Who's after you?" Tritia asked.
"He thinks he's being tricky, but I can hear his footsteps."
"Get out of the house," Tritia said. "Now. Go someplace and call the police."
"I already called the police. They refused to help me. They said --"
Ellen's voice was cut off, and a man's deep baritone came on the line.
"Hello?"
Tritia 'sheart leapt to her throat. It took all of her courage, all of her inner strength not to hang up the receiver. "Who is this?" she demanded in the most intimidating voice she could muster.
"This is Dr. Roberts. Who is this?"
"Oh, it's you." Tritia relaxed a little, breathing an audible sigh of relief. In the background, she could hear a male and female voice arguing. "This is Tritia Albin ."
" Tritia . Hello. I heard part of your conversation from this end. Ellen told you she was being chased, did she?"
"Yes."
"I'm sorry she disturbed you. Her sons have been trying to keep an eye on her, but they can't monitor her twenty-four hours a day, and lately each time she has a chance she calls someone and tells them she's being stalked." He breathed deeply, the heavy intake of air thick and rough over the phone. "I
don't know what we're going to do. The boys don't want to even consider it, but I told them that their mother's g9ing to have to seek some kind of counseling. I
refuse to treat her by simply pumping drugs into her body, and her emotional situation is far worse than I am equipped to handle. She may even have to be institutionalized for a short period of time. Who knows? I'm certainly no expert in these matters."
"What's happened to her?" Tritia asked.
"Grief. Repressed, pent-up emotions suddenly finding an outlet. As I said, I'm no expert, but it's clear that Bob's sui -- uh, death, triggered this whatever-it-is, acted as the catalyst." The arguing in the background grew louder, more heated. "Sorry, but you're going to have to excuse me. I think we have a slight emergency developing here. Thank you for your patience and cooperation. I'll be in touch."
He hung up before Tritia could say good-bye. She lowered the receiver slowly into its cradle. For some reason, she felt guilty, as though she had somehow betrayed Ellen's confidence. It was a strange thought, not at all logical, but then the entire conversation had been more than a little surrealistic. She had been relieved when the doctor had picked up the phone, grateful to hand over the reins of responsibility and decision, but she had not been able to do so wholeheartedly or with a clear conscience, though she trusted the doctor completely. She walked out of the house, back onto the porch, and sat down numbly in her chair. Ellen was obviously disturbed, obviously having some serious emotional/psychological problems, but for a moment there, before the doctor had come on the line, Tritia had actually believed that someone had been after Ellen, that someone had been in her house.
And she knew exactly who that someone was.
"Wow, look at the tits on that one." Lane grinned hugely.
Billy smiled wanly back. They were on the floor of The Fort, going through the _Playboys_. Ordinarily, Billy would have been just as caught up in their reading as Lane, but today was different. He felt restless, ill at ease, bored.
He stared down at the magazine on his lap, at the photo of the woman in the postal cap. She was without a doubt the most gorgeous, most perfect woman in all of their _Playboys_, but today he didn't feel excited looking at her. He felt uneasy. Was there something familiar about her eyes? Did her mouth look like . . . _his_?
Stop that, he told himself. He forced himself to look at her boobs, at the huge pinkish-brown nipples on the tips of her perfectly formed breasts. There was nothing about her tits that reminded him of the mailman or that was the least bit unusual or masculine. They were normal, healthy, good old American female breasts.
Still. . . .
"Guess what?" Lane said. His voice was casual, nonchalant, but it wasn't a natural nonchalance. Billy had known Lane for most of his life, and he could tell when his friend was lying and sometimes even what he was thinking just by the tone of his voice. This was not spur-of-the-moment. This was a purposeful, intentional casualness, something Lane had planned and practiced.
"What?" Billy said, equally cool.
Lane glanced slowly around, as if making sure that no one was peeking into the HQ from the outside or from the Big Room. He withdrew a crumpled folded envelope from his pants pocket, handing it over. "Check this out."
Billy glanced at the outside of the envelope. It was addressed to Lane at his house, and the return name in the upper left corner was Tama Barnes.
"Look inside," Lane prodded.
Billy took out the folded paper inside. It was a letter, written in an obviously female hand. He turned the letter over. Underneath the flowery cursive characters was a Xeroxed photo of a nude Hispanic woman. She was smiling, hands cupping her ample breasts,tegs spread wide. The photocopied picture was too smeared and dark and blurry to provide details, but Billy had seen plenty of details in the magazines on the floor, and his mind filled in what his eyes could not see.
"Read it," Lane said. He was grinning.
Billy turned the letter over and read. The letter started out with a standard salutation but quickly began describing in detail all the forms of pleasure that Tama was willing to give to Lane, all the sexual techniques at which she was an expert. Billy couldn't help smiling as he read what Tama wanted to do to Lane's "love pump."