Wild Man (Dream Man #2)(13)

I sighed, wondering what the heck I was doing there at all since three years ago when Ada met Vic and, because she was thirty-six and her biological clock was ticking so loud the personnel at NORAD were tracking it, she immediately dedicated herself to the sacred quest of making him her fiancé then her husband and now the man who was the father of her unborn child, Ada pretty much checked out of my life. She called me to make the cake for her engagement party then for her bridal shower, her wedding and now this. Only two of those cakes she paid me for and she asked for (and stupid me, I gave her) a discount on both. I’d only seen her on those occasions and all of them required me bringing a present. Other than that, Ada was all about sculpting (with chisel and hammer if she had to) Vic into the perfect suburban husband, wedding planning, house hunting, house decorating and baby making. She didn’t have time to be a friend unless it was to call on all of us to buy her presents and celebrate milestones of her life.

I didn’t even think she sent me a Christmas card last year.

And I had my own milestone to think about, I didn’t need to be here.

Okay, maybe it wasn’t a milestone. But whatever it was it was a big, huge stinking deal because no way that scene with Brock “Slim” Lucas in my kitchen was not a big, huge stinking deal.

I knew it.

I started thinking about how and when I could get out of there while handing around plates with slivers of cake and baby blue plastic forks on them but when I gave one to the woman sitting beside me and she muttered an annoyed, “Muthaf*cka.”

As it would, this surprised me so I looked at her to see her staring down at her nearly transparent slice of cake and I was right, she appeared annoyed.

I didn’t know her but had met her that day. Her name was Elvira, mocha skin, hair in stylish crop with blonde highlights at the long bangs, fabulous tangerine top that showed even more fabulous cle**age, skintight skirt that showed this baby had back and she would have been shorter than me if she wasn’t wearing four inch, killer, stiletto-heeled sandals. She came to the party with a cadre of beauties, all of whom I’d met in passing before at Ada’s milestone “celebrate me” celebrations, a knockout blonde named Gwen, a tall, svelte, modelesque blonde named Tracy and another modelesque, tall, svelte African American named Camille.

But I’d never met Elvira.

“How do you know Ada?” I asked and her eyes came to me.

“Don’t know the bitch and don’t wanna know a bitch who puts out bowls of peanuts, no honey roast, no salt, just motherf*ckin’ peanuts with the motherf*ckin’ skins still on them and some corn chips for a party and then she gives me a sliver of cake. Shit. What? Crazy,”

she replied and I stared at her mainly because her answer was crazy. Honest, but crazy.

Then I asked, “You crashed a baby shower?”

“No. Got dragged here by Beanpole,” she jerked her head at the tall, svelte, modelesque Tracy. “She didn’t wanna come alone. Gwen and Cam didn’t wanna come at all. I’m seein’

now why. Trace has got a heart of gold but no capacity to get it when people walk all over her, even when they’re doin’ it in high heels. She talked us into it with promises of employee discounts at her store. She works at Neiman’s.”

“Mm hmm,” I mumbled, thinking that would do it. There was a time in my life when I’d go to a really bad baby shower with the promise of an employee discount at Neiman’s. That time was over, though. As I had done frequently through the years, starting at around age six, I’d entered a new phase in my life. This one was one where Christian Louboutin didn’t factor but Harley Davidson did.

As I was thinking this, she suddenly and bizarrely announced, “Done with this shit. Let’s have cocktails.”

Then before I could open my mouth, she shot up to standing, grabbed her enormous purse that clunked and clinked when she did, hefted it up on her shoulder, grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the couch.

Then she declared loudly, “Smoke break!” and everyone’s eyes came to us, some of them shocked seeing as these days you could light up a doobie and no one would blink but if you lit up a smoke, you courted being publicly stoned to death. But most of the eyes were envious and probably not because they smoked, probably because they, like me and obviously Elvira, wanted to escape.

“Smoke break?” Ada asked, her face twisted in revulsion.

“Yeah, back deck okay?” Elvira asked but didn’t wait for an answer. She started tugging me to the sliding glass doors at the back of Ada’s picture perfect suburban home while jerking her chin at her posse.

I had no choice but to go but I did manage to bug my eyes out at Martha as I went; my nonverbal invitation for her to get her ass up and follow. I’d known Martha since we were in fifth grade. I moved out to Denver to be with Martha. Before marrying Damian, I lived with Martha. After leaving Damian I again lived with Martha. Therefore Martha read my nonverbal invitation and got her ass up.

“Ice,” I heard Elvira order, Tracy nodded and peeled off as Elvira tugged me out the door.

Then she let my hand go and sashayed to the picture perfect lawn furniture on the deck, folded then shoved my slice of cake in her mouth all in one go (though, it was so small, this wasn’t hard). Then she dropped the plate to the table, plonked down her massive purse which again clinked and clunked and, as I watched in unconcealed astonishment, she started unearthing the ingredients for cosmopolitans (including stainless steel cocktail shaker) from her purse as Martha, Gwen, Camille and I rounded the table.