Chapter 4
That evening, former cat burglar Rafaella "Nightshade" Diamond was sitting around her apartment, thinking. She was thrilled when she heard that her distant love, Mace, was no longer with Valerie Boston, and had been scheming to get him back. Recently, she'd been writing to schools, offering to speak to junior high and high school students about why one should avoid getting into the criminal life. But the schools would reject her; one high school even wrote her back two days ago, stating, "Our school's reputation depends on educating students to make right decisions, not brainwashing them to make wrong decisions. If an ex-jewel thief were to speak at assemblies, no one would take him/her seriously. We worry that you just may glamorize the career of crime, not discourage it."
She read over that letter furiously. "Those straight-laced, preachy assholes!" she lamented. "Don't they understand that I gave all that up for Sgt. Mace, and now I'm trying to launch a new career?" She crumpled up the letter and threw it in her garbage can. She immediately began to think about her younger sister, Cathleen. "My God, I'm always telling my sister not to go down the same path I did!" She turned on her television and switched channels through late night talk shows, infomercials and late movies.
Suddenly, her phone rang. As she went to it she muttered to herself, "It can't be Mace or Cathleen. It's a little late for him to get together with me, and she should be sleeping by now." She answered and saw Ms. Demeanor on the screen.
"Ms. Demeanor!" she answered, disgusted. "Why do you guys keep contacting me? I thought I told you to leave me the hell alone! Remember when I went to that suite and screamed at you all after Mace dumped me?"
She saw Ms. Demeanor walking somewhere as she saw the background moving. "Nightshade!" she said. "Nightshade, I'm with Buttons and Big Boss, and you'll never believe what I've been seeing."
Nightshade could hear pounding music beats now, and screaming and loud talking in the background. She asked, "Ms. Demeanor, where are you? What's all that noise, and music?"
"I'm at this club, China Grove," Ms. Demeanor said over the noise. "It's sure packed and hopping here tonight! And Mace is here with one of his colleagues!"
Nightshade looked confused. "All right, what would Mace be doing at a place like that? I thought he hated trance techno music and bubblegum pop remixes."
She saw Ms. Demeanor was out on the dance floor now. "I have a little surprise here you're not going to like – that is, if you're determined to get Mace back!" she called over the noise. "This may just hinder all your future attempts!"
She waited as the henchwoman searched the crowd, then seconds later, turned her cell phone away from her. Nightshade was shocked to see Mace dancing with yet another woman unknown to her.
"Surprise, Nightshade!" Ms. Demeanor called. "Your tough guy lover has just landed himself someone new. Her name is Cheryl Raleigh."
"Who?! Cheryl Raleigh?" Nightshade blasted. "That no-good, two-timing son of a whore! I'm trying to win him back, and he goes and pulls this goddamn stunt? Get closer to them, Ms. Demeanor!"
Ms. Demeanor walked up until she showed Mace on Nightshade's telephone screen.
"Mace!" Nightshade shouted. "Mace, it's Nightshade! Listen, you bastard, I know you can hear me! I've been bending over backwards to get you back since you split up with that Barbie doll wannabe tramp, Valerie, and not only will you not answer my calls and put a fucking restraining order on me, but you're also out dancing with yet another bitch?!"
Ms. Demeanor had given Mace her phone as Nightshade kept ranting. "I've been dedicating my days to turning my life around and landing something legitimate because I thought our love was something worth fighting for! And this is how you contribute to the war effort?! You thoughtless piece of human garbage! You better get your act together and make some time to come see me soon because–"
Mace was unconvinced and unmoved. Wordlessly, he pressed the "End Call" button on Ms. Demeanor's cell phone and gave it back to her.
"There!" he declared. "Now you get outta here an' leave Cheryl an' me, and Highway an' Janice alone! We're on a date here, an' yer all just harassin' us!" Ms. Demeanor walked away unimpressed.
Meanwhile, Nightshade was listening to a buzz and a recorded message. She slammed on the call waiting button and screamed, "Mace! Mace, where the hell are you?! Mace, hello, answer me!!" She slammed down her phone and screamed. Seconds later, she heard a loud knock.
She looked through the peephole and opened her door to see a woman around the same age as her, in a pink bathrobe. A neighbor living in the apartment close to her. She looked peeved at her.
"What's going on?" she asked. "It's getting close to midnight, we're trying to sleep, and you're screaming in here."
Nightshade looked embarrassed. "Sorry!" she said lowly. "I just got a call informing me that my ex-beau found another girlfriend and is gallivanting downtown."
"You mean Sgt. Mace?" the neighbor asked. "The guy some of us heard you arguing with last month?" She patted her shoulder to comfort her. "Listen, I don't think the guy is into you anymore. It's not worth it wasting all this energy. Maybe you should get some sleep, too, and find someone else in the morning."
Nightshade just stared at her looking numb. How would she ever get past her romance with – and heartbreak from – Sgt. Colt "Mace" Howards?
Late the next morning, Valerie was on her laptop, looking at some video online for a commercial she was working on when the doorbell rang. She answered to see Marilyn with her children in tow.
"Marilyn," she said. "What a surprise to see you. You really should've called first, I would've tidied up the house for you." She let them into the house, and noticed Marilyn looked like a mess. She also noted how quickly and fiercely she was introducing the children.
"What's wrong, Marilyn?" she asked. "You look a little rattled."
"Oh, God, I was having flashbacks from seeing Turbo Tu-Tone two nights ago!" Marilyn ranted. "I don't mean to be rude, but I need coffee?"
"I can tell you need some," Valerie noted. "Oh, but I haven't drank much coffee since I got that milkshake maker for my birthday. How about milkshakes for everyone instead?" Justin and Bridget smiled and cheered in acceptance, and noticed a small smile from Jeremy, looking up from another book he was reading. Right away, this prompted her to introduce her son to the Hobbes family.
"He looks to be such a sweet kid," Marilyn said. "He looks so much like Corinne." She whispered into Valerie's ear, and Valerie nodded and left. She returned with Snakes and Ladders and set it up on the coffee table.
"Why don't you two play with Jeremy while I talk with Mrs. Boston?" Marilyn said to her children. "It'll be just like playing with Cousin Corinne."
Valerie prepared the ingredients in a tall shaking cup, then as the machine was running, said to Marilyn, "So, tell me what went on with Bullseye the other night. I saw you at lunch, but I couldn't get anything out of you. You just stared off into space."
"Oh, Bullseye was wonderful, especially to the children," Marilyn said. "He even thinks Justin should become a police officer, and I think that's what he'll be trying to do with him. It's when I saw Turbo Tu-Tone in the buffet line at the restaurant that things started going south."
Valerie stared at her houseguest, stunned. "You can't be serious! What was he doing there, attempting to rob the cashiers?"
"I'm dead serious, Valerie. To start with, you remember that story I told about how I followed police cars chasing a stolen truck that forced a sudden stop? Turbo Tu-Tone was behind the wheel, but what I probably didn't tell you was that I think he was flirting with me as he was being carried away. I know he tried to hit on me."
Valerie turned off the milkshake maker, but before she could get the cups, "Turbo Tu-Tone tried to hit on you? Ugh, he and Big Boss' other bozos tried to get me to go out with them, and Big Boss too, most of all. And he would never accept that I was never into him." She retrieved two coffee mugs and three small cups from the cupboard. "What did he do to you?"
"Oh, nothing much, just shamelessly flirt with me – though I never noticed, but I suspected – and basically told me that he came just to see me. He even took a picture of Bullseye and me with his camera."
"He probably showed that picture to the Big Boss," Valerie said as she handed Marilyn her drink, then went to serve the children. "That is one man you don't want to get involved with. He's a crime lord around here, and Turbo is part of his vicious gang of criminals responsible for most crimes in existence – armed robberies, gang recruitment, thefts, extortion, racketeering, counterfeits. You name it, he'll do it. Well, maybe with the exception of prostitution." Valerie turned to see the children involved with their game, not paying attention to the conversation. Still, she could see Marilyn looked disapproving of her bringing up prostitution in their hearing.
"Sorry to say that last thing in front of your daughter," she muttered. "I know kids her age are impressionable."
"You couldn't come up with more appropriate synonyms?" Marilyn wondered. She looked at Jeremy. "I don't mean to criticize, but if this is how you talk here at home–"
"It WAS how I talked at home back in Parrish, Indiana," Valerie said, "especially when I was fighting with my ex-husband, Jeremy's father. And as horrid as his hearing is, he's heard worse from the ex, believe me. But please, let's not talk about that now." She sipped her milkshake, then took a bigger drink. "Big Boss and Turbo both tried to pursue me while I was with Barricade and some of his colleagues. There are three more who were also interested in me, Buttons McBoomBoom, Dr. Badvibes and Rock Crusher. Buttons is really scary; he has machine guns coming from his chest, for God's sake. Rock Crusher dresses like a jailbird, and I don't know about his personality, except he looks too stupid to have any. Then there's Dr. Badvibes. He was a little more polite in trying to win me over, but he needed to lose that freakish, geeky look. The others, I'm sure only wanted me to be a notch on their bedposts, if you get my drift, and that's why I wouldn't date any of them. Sure I was hungry for sex as well – I hadn't had any since Jeremy was born – but at least the C.O.P.S. showed me love as well."
She looked at Justin and Bridget playing happily with Jeremy. "Besides, Marilyn, and this is another reason why you should avoid the crooks – dating one of them can have you setting a bad example for your kids."
Marilyn looked at them, thought of Turbo and gasped. "Good point, Valerie. I'll stay with Bullseye."
"And what do you think of Bullseye?"
Marilyn smiled, looking love-struck. "I think he's wonderful," she said. "He's an excellent conversationalist, telling me about his past career accomplishments. An officer as well as a pilot. I only thought he gave orders to cops in cars as he kept track of pursuits from the air. But it turns out he has just as impressive a capture record as my husband did. And he's so attentive, too. I told him all about my accomplishments and living in Arizona, and he seemed rather interested. I was thinking maybe he wanted to live in Arizona himself. He asked about my husband, and I told him not in front of the kids, and he respected that. Oh, and I already mentioned how he is with the children. I honestly believe Justin wants to bond and have a relationship with him, I do. The only thing is he seemed a bit young for me. Did you ask how old he was?"
"I did focus on his face when he was rejecting me," Valerie answered. "He seemed to be no more than five years younger than you." She touched the back of her hand. "But if you're as confident about this as I've seen you at your work, then dating a younger man should be no problem for you." She thought about her dinner date with Hardtop four months ago, and shuddered. "Me, I prefer my men to be at least a few years older."
"So, how have you and Barricade been?" Marilyn asked curiously. "I mean, since you officially chose him as your one and only?"
"We've been seeing each other around," Valerie answered. "Of course, he's been working evening and night shifts most of this week, and as you saw, I've been pretty busy myself since the day we've hired you. I've been working all freaking week for that damn Gorgon Entertainment company, producing a series of new commercials for their music television stations and the affiliates. I mean, my God, besides their regular MusicMix and MusicMix Lite channels, which play twenty-four hours a day; I also had to do stuff for MusicMix Heavy, MusicMix Ghetto, Punch MusicMix, even that MusicMix Lite Retro. I have some stuff for that Lite Retro commercial that I'm going to send to Matt right away. Too bad you were already on assignment when this came up, I could've used your help."
"Neither Lancer nor Sussex mentioned anything to me."
"Well, Austin and Josh and Scott were willing to do this with me, as was another one of our younger workers, Wendy Salem. We could've gotten this done in two days if other project managers were willing to help us. But no, they chose to be old fogies who didn't want to deal with the pounding and the thumping!" Valerie drank more of her milkshake, hoping it would settle her nerves. "Thank God Peter and Jill were immediately added to the task when they were finished with previous assignments. I tell you, after this, I'm not going dancing at a nightclub until goddamn New Year's Eve! I'll tell Barricade it's strictly dinner, bowling and movies for a while!"
"Let's talk about your future," Marilyn suggested. "What are you going to do when you decide to… um… live together?"
Valerie answered right away, as if she'd been thinking about it for months. "I will be asking Barricade if that bitch, Linda Fortense, is still next door to him. I'm guessing she is, and she just found work at another agency here in town. If she is, I'll persuade him to move in with me. She was one of the five people we fired because she kept voicing her low opinion of my parenting, remember? Can you imagine what it'd be like living next door to her? Besides, my sister, Karen would want me to stay in her neighborhood, so she can keep taking care of Jeremy after school until I pick him up."
"That would be a better idea," Marilyn suggested, then looked at Jeremy again. Justin was helping him move his piece along the board. "Especially for Jeremy. I mean, who do you know in Barricade's neighborhood that will voluntarily look after him when you can't?"
Just minutes later, on her turn, Bridget landed on a square near the end of the game that was the beginning of a chute. She slid all the way down to a square numbered twenty-six. She immediately started to cry and Justin tried to calm her.
"Relax, Bridget, it's just a game!" he said.
She stopped crying but still looked pouty. Jeremy had an idea. "Mom!" he called. "I think… Bridget… needs… another… milkshake. Maybe… it'll… make her… feel… better."
"I was just about to offer Mrs. Hobbes another one," his mother replied. At first, Marilyn looked hesitant, but Valerie said, "Oh, it's okay. I have lots of milk. There's still half a jug left."
"Since you put it that way… all right," Marilyn responded.
Valerie turned to the boys. "What about you boys?"
"I'm good, thanks," Justin said.
"I still… have… some of… mine… left," Jeremy said.
Valerie retrieved the milk and other ingredients for another round.
"So who is this Nightshade?" Cheryl asked.
She had Mace over to her house two evenings after overhearing Nightshade phone rant at China Grove. She'd thought about that incident and Nightshade after she went home from her date, that whole night and into the next day. She decided to call Mace on Sunday afternoon, and was able to reach him at his work. Now, he was standing with her in her kitchen, poised to explain his romantic past.
"Nightshade used to be a cat burglar, workin' fer the Big Boss," he explained. "She's known to be very greedy, especially when it comes to jewelry an' money, but she's probably stolen more jewelry than money. Wouldn't put that past her. It started about six months after Bulletproof formed C.O.P.S., that we'd been carryin' on a romance fer two years or so, before I met this other woman, Valerie Boston. You don't know anythin' about her either, do ya?"
Cheryl shook her head rapidly. "First, I want to hear about your earlier romance, Nightshade," she said.
"Like I said, it was six months after I joined C.O.P.S.," Mace said. "That day, I was invited to a charity ball to help raise money for the city's homeless. I tried to decline, 'cuz back then, I wasn't much into social gatherin's, an' I really wasn't interested in datin'. Ya should've heard one of my colleagues, Mainframe, jokin' about it. Drove me damn crazy! Anyway, later that day, I received a report that a girl named Cathleen Diamond had been kidnapped. It led me straight to Nightshade's apartment, where I found the whole place trashed and a gun left as evidence. I tried to arrest Nightshade on that spot, but she wouldn't comply. She insisted that she never did it, that she was set up by Buttons McBoomBoom 'cuz Big Boss wanted her to steal the charity ball money. She even tried to escape by tellin' me my shoe was untied, even though I was wearin' boots."
Cheryl immediately thought of her first encounter with Buttons McBoomBoom at the club on the date, and shuddered. "Dear God!" she moaned. "Buttons McBoomBoom! I swear, that freak has me in his very palm!"
"Anyway," Mace continued, "Nightshade told me that Cathleen Diamond was her sister, and she insisted that I help to set her free, but not before I turned her in a wanted criminal… again, she wasn't havin' it. She led me to the crooks' hideout and Buttons McBoomBoom, where she apparently showed me the disguise he wore pretendin' to be her. Green stripes and red polka dots. She said she looked awful in it, but… I kinda reassured her otherwise. Meanwhile, may I show ya the dumb-ass monkey suit I had to wear to the ball?"
Cheryl made a muffling noise, trying not to laugh as she pictured the ex-lovers in their formal wear.
"Anyway, there I was, standin' on the lookout fer Big Boss, while Nightshade tried to crack the combination to the safe, where Cathleen was trapped inside. Right when Big Boss saw me, he called in two more of his men, Turbo Tu-Tone an' Berserko. I stopped 'em before they could get to the safe, to protect the money from bein' stolen as Nightshade freed her sister. An' when she got her back, she gave me a thank you kiss fer my help. Later on, as Mainframe was crackin' her damn jokes, Nightshade called me at the headquarters to thank me, an' she even blew me a kiss. We managed to git her off.
"Fast forward to around six months later, an' Bulletproof suspended Highway an' me fer fist-fightin'. Don't ask me what was said, it was pretty offensive. Anyway, I decided to use this time off to meet Nightshade at an outdoor restaurant. There, she did the unthinkable – she asked me to marry her. I told her yes, on the condition that she gives up her criminal ways an' go straight."
Cheryl began to laugh aloud. Mace gave her a quizzical look and said, "What's so strange about me askin' Nightshade to give up crime to marry me?"
"It's not that," she said. "I was just laughing at the fact that she asked you to marry her! I'm sorry, but that's just very unromantically wrong! Why, when Wayne spent Christmas with me alone when I was twenty-three years old, he came out in his police uniform shirtless – he was just a rookie cop then – got down on his knee and presented me with my Christmas gift, my engagement ring. Then, in his best studly, sexy voice, he asked me to marry him. It was like out of the pages of one of those Harlequin romances. That's how it should be."
"I'll keep that in mind," Mace said half-jokingly. "Anyway, then I began to ask about the string of jewelry store thefts that had been occurrin' over the past coupla months. She insisted she had nothin' to do with 'em, but I wouldn't believe her. When I tried to arrest her, she gave me this big ol' kiss with her knockout lipstick. I was outta it fer a little bit, an' when I awoke, I was left with Nightshade's purse, which had the lipstick an' a map to the area with all the jewelry store thefts. I showed this to Bulletproof, an' he quickly reinstated me to go after her. Guess what I found when I got there?"
"Nightshade holding the store owner hostage?" Cheryl guessed.
"Close," he answered. "Nightshade was cowerin' way up high on the top shelf, away from Shredder, the store's vicious ol' guard dog. I got the impression that it was the owner himself who was robbin' all those stores to sell the stolen loot in his store."
Cheryl whistled. "Talk about being desperate to make some money. Some people just weren't meant for a business career. So, Nightshade was being truthful all along? That's a switch."
"Yeah," Mace agreed. "An' when that bastard sent that damn dog after me, I found myself joinin' Nightshade on that top shelf. The owner himself was gettin' away, so I borrowed the lipstick for myself an' kissed the dog to sleep. The next thing I knew, Nightshade herself took off to pursue the crooked owner an' arrested him herself." He lowered his head a bit. "She was still put away fer attempted robbery."
Cheryl laughed louder than she did before. "Okay, this is getting too funny," she said. "You, a supposed tough guy, wearing beauty products made for women? Oh, wait until the girls at work hear about this tomorrow! And a jewel thief making an arrest on the real guilty suspect in a caper? Suddenly, I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone!"
He waited until she was quiet to finish his story. "Anyway, when I talked with her in jail, I told her that the judge planned to reduce her sentence to probation for her part in the caper. Then, I surprised her with an engagement an' told her I bought it, I didn't steal it. She kissed me right then an' there, but I never wiped off her lipstick, an' she got some residue on her, so we both ended up fallin' asleep. We awoke about a half-hour later, an' I immediately wiped off the lipstick with my wet backhand before puttin' the ring on her. I wiped her lips too, an' we had a more romantic kiss this time."
"And what happened to Nightshade after that?" she asked.
"A lot of my off-duty time was devoted to her," he replied. "I only took her out to family restaurants; I don't like spendin' so much money on a girlfriend, though I knew she loved the theater an' other arts, an' she always expected diamonds an' jewelry – now those can be expensive. Most of the time, I took her dancin' an' sometimes durin' a slow song, they'd have the floor cleared just for the two of us. An' I loved to go swimmin' with her. One time just last summer, we even swam in the pond in Empire City Park, though not fer long. We had to git out before the authorities caught us. That kinda stuff's illegal, y'know.
"Then, things began to change just this spring. Nightshade started gettin' greedy again, and began actin' suspicious around me. I kinda got the hint from my team that she's been at it again, slippin' back to her old criminal ways. She got cold and distant towards me, though she said I started actin' like that with her first. I've also seen her out with hordes of other guys simply fer payment. She told me I wasn't satisfyin' her personal needs. As fer her crimes, I even saw videotaped evidence that she might have broken into the jewelry store to rob it, through when I brought it up with her, she said that could've been anyone."
"Was she sleeping with these men she was going out with?" Cheryl asked. "That's damn nasty!"
"She refused to tell me, and yet she wanted to know why I was suddenly bein' so mean to her," Mace answered. "Then, on Memorial Day weekend, at the annual Empire City police picnic, my colleagues an' I all met this real beautiful woman, Valerie Boston. Suddenly, I knew I didn't want Nightshade anymore."
"Valerie Boston," Cheryl repeated. "Never met her."
"Oh, she was really special," Mace told her. "She has an eleven-year-old son with Shaken Baby Syndrome, which was caused by her bastard of an ex-husband. She preaches about keepin' her patience with him all the time. He can be noisy handful at times, but he's really sweet. Did you see that episode of Eye on Empire City last month, where Valerie an' I were on?"
"I don't do news programs, they're so boring. Anyway, you can tell me more about Valerie later, okay? She sounds like someone I should meet. How did Nightshade take you dating her?"
"Not so good. First of all, I was competin' with four of my colleagues fer Valerie's hand. When Nightshade learned about me an' her, she became furious. I won't get into great detail of all the things she did – then I'd be here 'til midnight – but she sabotaged a good part of my time with her. Once, when I took her son swimmin' with me, she even shattered the glass dome in the ceilin' as a way to greet me!" Mace especially thought about the time Nightshade tried to seduce him at Valerie's house, and when she and Big Boss ruined their trip to the movies, then tried to move in on him at the Electric Bullet nightclub. He shuddered violently.
"I have this feeling she's going to horn in on me if she gets my address," Cheryl said. "I hope you managed to finally get rid of her… or so you thought."
"A few days after Valerie an' I were on that show," Mace said, "Nightshade called my apartment seven times. I kept track. Anyway, I got tired of hearin' her messages, so I finally picked up an' invited myself over there, if that meant gettin' rid of her fer good. She tried to convince me that everythin' my colleagues said about her was false, but I wasn't havin' it. I proceeded to bring up what she did to me in the spring, but she defended it, sayin' she was only takin' advice from her sister. Why Cathleen would tell her to date other men, I dunno. An' she added that she was goin' to the Big Boss fer a friendly ear. As fer takin' guys money, there was this shit about how rich girls expect men to pay fer everythin' and some didn't have the cash, so she borrowed their credit cards.
"When I brought Valerie into this, she immediately called her a 'cop-chasin' slut' – her words – an' said that she learned about her datin' activities from her secretary. Nightshade claimed that Valerie's an' my love wasn't legit, and she added that shit about how she used her son's condition to spoil him. Nightshade believes Valerie's a weak an' lazy mom, an' that my parents would think the same way an' never approve of her – that last part was true. But that claim about Valerie bein' a bad mother was utter crap if I heard it! First of all, some of the major things I liked about Valerie was that she's very down-to-earth, grounded, an' she doesn't want a man to spoil her with expensive stuff all the time."
"I'm like that, too," Cheryl said. "If I were to marry a rich man, and he started surprising me with diamonds all the time, I'd have to tell him to slow it down. I don't want to be spoiled, either. After all, what kind of example does that set for my kids?"
"Exactly Valerie's thoughts," Mace said. "Which is why I admired the way she was with her kid. But Nightshade always thought that I wanted Valerie 'cuz Valerie had a better body than Nightshade. Valerie's got long, wavy blonde hair, crystal blue eyes, an' legs as long as the eye can see."
"If she's the same age as I am, or nearly so," Cheryl said, "I'll be shocked. I'll be demanding her secret to looking that beautiful at forty." She laughed whole-heartedly.
"So I take it ya wanna meet her?" Mace grinned.
"If she's as down-to-earth as you say, then of course I would. I just wish I had the skills to attract five officers at once."
Mace frowned a little. "Now, that sounded a bit insecure, if ya ask me." He walked closer to her and nuzzled her cheek. "You know how beautiful an' lively you are. You showed the latter at the club the other night, didn't ya? Why would you need the others when ya got me?"
Cheryl smiled back. "Of course, you're right. I just want to know her secrets, that's all." She kissed him lustrously for a few moments.
Earlier that day, Valerie had just completed her presentation speech for the MusicMix commercials. She wanted to take a break from her laptop, but then remembered her radio script for JEWEL-FM. The radio station for which she did a commercial in the late summer. She had suggested it to them when they accepted, and had been working on it as a side project. She hadn't worked on it at all since resuming work after the interviews, and wanted to see how much left she had to do. She took her laptop out to the living room, where Jeremy was playing with some toy cars.
It was one final scene, then she'd revise it later. She typed as she watched Jeremy play. After writing three pages, she finally had the plotline wrapped up, and saved her document. At that time her phone rang. She went to her kitchen to see Barricade's name on the caller I.D.
"Why, hello," she said when she saw his image. "What a relief to finally see and talk to you."
"I take it you had a busy week?" he guessed.
"You should've been with me," she said. "Six commercials for the MusicMix music station. I spent a whole damn week searching for appropriate video, getting it in a certain order that will win the clients over, searching for extra stuff to put in for the 'build-up' they need, recording voice-overs. Thank God for the younger generation working at our company. I have a damn good mind to call my cable company and cancel all my MusicMix channels. I have no desire to ever watch another music video!"
Barricade looked pitiful for her.
"Oh, and I also finished my first draft of my radio play for JEWEL-FM," she added. "I never told you anything about it, have I? It's about a woman who's pregnant with her police officer husband's baby, but he's suddenly killed on duty one day. So she tries to get back into the dating scene, wondering who will accept her and her baby. Of course, she is met with criticism by other police families for not giving herself enough time to mourn. It's supposed to be pretty funny with a bit of drama thrown in."
"Sounds interesting," he said. "So I take it you're all finished with what you have to do? How would you and Jeremy like to come over then? I'll cook up something really nice."
"Why, dinner at your house sounds exquisite," she accepted. "I'd love to. Just let me get Jeremy ready, and I'll see you in fifteen, twenty minutes." She hung up, turned off her laptop, went to her room to change her clothes and makeup. She also picked out a nice sweatshirt for Jeremy to change into.
When Valerie arrived, she was immediately turned on by Barricade's outfit. A white button-down shirt with a green pattern design she couldn't identify, and black slacks. She kissed him and whistled, and said, "Classy outfit. You put that on just for dinner? It looks real stylish on you."
"Yeah, I should be a plainclothes detective," Barricade joked as he led mother and son into the living room.
"I just wanted to try out a new chicken pie recipe," he said. "One of my aunts e-mailed it to me. It sounds really good."
"You mean one of those things you make from scratch?" Valerie asked. "With a real pie crust and everything? I don't think I've had one of those in years, probably since my wedding."
In the kitchen, Valerie helped prepare the meal; she was mixing the peas, carrots and corn while Barricade was chopping the boneless chicken breasts and added gravy. As she poured the vegetables in with the meat, she suddenly began to think about what she said to Marilyn about him, about who should move in with whom. She noticed that he wasn't talking about anything related to it, or their future; just a recent phone call from one of his sisters about a fight she had with one of their brothers. Valerie wasn't paying much attention; she wondered when he would stop talking so she could bring this up.
He noticed she looked a little lost to him. "Are you okay, Valerie?' he asked. "What's wrong? I don't think you heard another word I said when I got to the part about Reggie calling Colleen a whore."
"I was just thinking," she said. "I had Marilyn over to my place yesterday, and while we were talking about my MusicMix project, somehow you came up."
Now Barricade was suddenly interested in what she had to say. "Really?"
"Yes, and since I picked you, and I'm now eager to meet your whole large family, I think maybe it's time we talked about our future. I know it's only been almost five months since we met, and you've had my undivided attention for two weeks, but still."
"It's okay. I look at you and Jeremy, and while you don't even look like you're struggling, it's obvious that you want to get married." He took two steps forward to take her hand. "I do, too. Most of my unmarried team members want to as well."
"Which is why you all competed for my hand to begin with," she laughed, then calmed down quickly. "But seriously, Barricade, I do think that if we want to start living as husband and wife, we need to start discussing plans for us. I was telling Marilyn that maybe you should move in with me, that is, when you feel the time is right."
Barricade looked shocked, but saw Valerie looked pretty serious about it. "Are you sure?" he asked. "Because given all the times you've been here – every time I hosted dinner – I was thinking that maybe you should move in with me. My God, all the love we made…"
"Including that time Linda Fortense walked in on us from next door?" Valerie reminded him. "That's one of the major reasons why I want you to move in with me. I really do not feel like living next door to her! Remember when I told you about that fiasco with the Shaken Baby Syndrome awareness commercial last month? I must have. She was one of five people I got fired from work as a result. She's probably still pissed at me for it. I'm sorry, but I don't want to get into a puissant bitching match with her every time she sees me in your backyard. And if she comes over and starts hitting Jeremy because she doesn't like him running around screaming–"
"I get it, I get it," Barricade replied. "Is that the only reason why you don't want to live in this house?"
"Well, speaking of Jeremy, what'll happen if I were to go out of town on business and you're at the headquarters?" she asked. "Who in this neighborhood is going to look after him? Certainly not that bitch, so don't even think about her. And I don't know of anyone else who could and would muster enough patience to properly care for a child like Jeremy. I have to stay in Karen's neighborhood; that's the reason why I live in the house I chose on Turin."
Barricade nodded and said softly, "I understand."
"It shouldn't be so hard," Valerie said. "All you need to pack are your books, clothes, all the food out of your refrigerator and freezer and miscellaneous items – including your mother's china and silverware. My house is already furnished for you."
"You already convinced me. All right, I'll move in with you. Just tell me when, and I'll enlist some packing help." He let her fill the pie crust before he packed on the top part, and put it in the oven. She kissed his cheek.
"And speaking of your refrigerator and freezer," she said, "where do you keep your French fries? I want to get them ready."
"I have a bag in the freezer part of the fridge here," he answered, "but maybe we should wait fifteen minutes before we add them."
She smiled devilishly at him. "Then maybe we should speed up the process." She wrapped herself around him, and they started making out, Valerie stopping to check the time every few minutes, ignoring all of her son's outbursts. When he softly reminded her of the time, Valerie left to put fries on a cookie sheet, then when it was back in, they resumed their love.
The next morning, as Mace and Barricade were about to check into the headquarters, the heard a familiar woman yelling out Mace's name. He turned and saw a vengeful Nightshade walking quickly towards him. Before he could speak, she extended her hand to slap his face.
"You son of a bitch!" she spat at her ex-boyfriend. "How dare you sneak around with another woman like that?! Are you completely oblivious to my feelings?"
"Nightshade, you aint got no feelin's!" Mace spat back. "An" I ain't got nothin' to say to you!" Nightshade slapped him again, then kicked his leg hard.
Barricade started to intervene, but Mace stopped him. "I was the one who dated her," he said. "I can handle this. You go inside." He was hopping around on his good leg now.
"Look, Nightshade, I thought I made it perfectly clear!" he told her. "Whatever we had, I don't want it anymore. How quickly you ferget that night I came to yer apartment an' told ya off!"
"Excuse me for being so optimistic!" she sneered. "I thought that you'd change your mind and come back to me once you broke up with that fake blonde slut, Valerie. But no, you're too hard-headed to see the feelings I still have for you!"
"You slipped back into the life crime when I told ya to go straight!" he shouted. "A cop an' a career jewel thief? Ya got any idea how that'll make me look? At least Cheryl does somethin' legitimate with her life."
"I'll bet you don't even know what Cheryl does for a living!"
"Wouldn't you like to know?" Mace hopped towards the door. "You leave me alone, understand? The next time I see ya in my face, I'll cuff ya an' take ya in to Bulletproof myself!" He hopped into the building now.
Nightshade just shook her head and furiously walked away. She now decided she had another romance to break up.