Touch & Go (Tessa Leoni, #2)(2)

Justin gave me carte blanche. Furniture, art, draperies, carpets. Antiques, no antiques, interior decorator, no interior decorator. He didn’t care. Do whatever I had to do, spend whatever I had to spend, just make this our home.

So I did. Like that scene out of Pretty Woman, except it involved slathering painters and decorators and antiques dealers, all plying their wares while I sat my pregnant bulk on various divans and with an elegant wave of my hand ordered a bit of this, a dash of that. Frankly, I had fun with it. Finally, a real-world application for my fine-art skills. I could not only fashion jewelry out of silver-infused clay, I could renovate a Boston brownstone.

We were giddy those days. Justin was working a major hydroelectric project. He’d helicopter in and out, literally, and I’d show off the latest progress on our home, while he rubbed my lower back and brushed back my hair to nuzzle the side of my neck.

Then, Ashlyn. And joy, joy, joy. Happy, happy, happy. Justin beamed, snapped photos, showed off his precious baby girl to anyone who made eye contact. His crew filed into our Boston town house, muddy boots left in the gleaming foyer so a bunch of former Navy SEALs and ex-marines could make googly eyes at our sleeping daughter in her pink-coated nursery. They swapped tips on diaper changing and proper swaddling, then set out to teach a newborn how to burp the ABCs.

Justin informed them their sons would never date his daughter. They accepted the news good-naturedly, then made googly eyes at me instead. I told them they could have whatever they wanted, as long as they’d change diapers at 2:00 A.M. This led to so many suggestive comments, Justin escorted his crew back out of the house.

But he was happy and I was happy and life was good.

That’s love, right? You laugh, you cry, you share midnight feedings and eventually, months later you have really tender sex where you realize things are slightly different, but still, fundamentally great. Justin showered me in jewelry and I took up the requisite yoga while learning hideously expensive places to buy baby clothes. Sure, my husband was gone a lot, but I was never the kind of woman who was afraid of being alone. I had my daughter and soon Dina, who helped out so I could return to playing in my jewelry studio, where I fashioned and created and nurtured and glowed.

Now, Justin slowed the Range Rover, starting the futile search for curbside parking. Our town house included a lower-level garage, a luxury nearly worth the property taxes, but of course Justin saved the space for me, leaving him to play the highly competitive game of street parking in downtown Boston.

He passed by our town house once and my gaze automatically went up to the third-story window, Ashlyn’s room. It was dark, which surprised me as she was supposed to be staying in for the evening. Maybe she simply hadn’t bothered with the overhead light, sitting before the glow of her laptop instead. Fifteen-year-olds could spend hours like that, I’d been learning. Earbuds implanted, eyes glazed over, lips sealed tightly shut.

Justin found a space. A quick reverse, a short pull forward and he’d neatly tucked the Range Rover into place. He came around the front to get my door and I let him.

Last few seconds now. My hands were clenched white-knuckle on my lap. I tried to force myself to breathe. In. Out. Simple as that. One step at a time, one moment after another.

Would he start by kissing me on the lips? Perhaps the spot he’d once discovered behind my ear? Or maybe we’d both simply strip, climb into bed, get it over with. Lights off, eyes squeezed shut. Maybe, he’d be thinking about her the whole time. Maybe, it shouldn’t matter. He was with me. I’d won. Kept my husband, the father of my child.

Door opened. My husband of eighteen years loomed before me. He held out his hand. And I followed him, out of the car, down the sidewalk, neither of us speaking a word.


JUSTIN PAUSED AT THE FRONT DOOR. He’d been on the verge of punching the code into the keypad, when he stopped, frowned, then shot a quick glance at me.

“She disarmed the system,” he muttered. “Left the door unsecured again.”

I glanced at the door’s keypad and saw what he meant. Justin had installed the system himself; not a mechanically controlled bolt lock, but an electronically controlled one. Punch in the right code, the system disarmed the locks, the door opened. No code, no entry.

The system had seemed to be an elegant solution to a teenage daughter who more often than not forgot her key. But for the system to work, it had to be armed, which was proving to be Ashlyn’s next challenge.

Justin tried the knob, and sure enough, the door opened soundlessly into the darkened foyer.

My turn to frown. “She could’ve at least left on a light.”

My stiletto heels clipped loudly as I crossed the foyer to flip on the overhead chandelier. No longer holding on to Justin’s arm, I didn’t walk as steadily. I wondered if he noticed. I wondered if he cared.

I made it to the wall panel. Flipped the first light switch. Nothing. I tried again, flipping up and down several times now. Nothing.

“Justin…,” I started in puzzlement.

Just as I heard him say: “Libby…”

A funny popping sound, like a small-caliber gun exploding. Whizzing. Justin’s body suddenly arching. I watched, open mouthed, as he stood nearly on his tiptoes, back bowing, while a guttural sound of pain wrenched through his clenched teeth.

I smelled burning flesh.

Then I saw the man.

Big. Bigger than my six-two, two-hundred-pound husband who worked in the construction field. The massive black-clad figure loomed at the edge of the foyer, hand clutching a strange-looking pistol with a square-shaped barrel. Green confetti, I noted, almost hazily. Little pieces of bright green confetti, raining down on my hardwood foyer as my husband danced macabre and the faceless man took another step forward.