“Shannon Mercer.” I had a momentary fear that he might murder me for bringing his name up, but hey, he chose a small town to live in. And frankly, if he was going to end up killing me, I wanted him to have to work up an explanation about my disappearance and sweat a little over it.
“Ooooooh,” she said. I swear, I thought she was going to start singing the kissing in a tree song like a grade school child. She got a sort of blushy dreamy look on her face. “He is so beautiful.”
In spite of everything, I found the grin inching up the side of my face, followed by a nervous giggle. “Yeah. He is pretty hot.”
“You did good, honey.”
I was pretty sure she wouldn’t maintain that position if she had more facts about Shannon. This made me wildly curious about what she thought Shannon did for a living.
“And he’s such a good man,” she continued. “But I don’t have to tell you. I guess you’ll be going on the trips with him?”
“Ummm, yeah, the trips. Sure.” I had no idea what this lady was talking about, but I was fascinated to know more about the saintly portrait Shannon had painted of himself.
“I think it’s just so lovely that he donates so much of his time to helping all those poor people in those destitute countries.”
Oh, dear lord. It took all my powers of self-control not to bust out laughing at the deranged idea of Shannon doing extended charity work like some black-clad special ops Mother Theresa.
The sales lady sized me up and then handed me a sexy little black lace number. The lace was elegant and made me think of something a Victorian-era courtesan might wear. “He’ll like this,” June insisted.
I checked the size. It was my size, all right. She had a good eye. “I’ll take it.”
“You don’t want to try it on to make sure?”
“No, I’m sure.” I kind of needed to get away from her. This lady had a crush on Shannon and thought he did charity work. If only she knew. I would never do it, of course, but there was this sadistic part of me that wanted to tell her the truth about him. Just to watch the color drain out of her face.
I frowned, realizing the dark road my thoughts had turned down.
“Something wrong?” she asked.
“Oh, no. I was just thinking about something else.”
“Now, I’ve got all sorts of fun and interesting toys and edible body paints and...”
“No, the lingerie is fine.”
“Is it for Valentine’s Day? That’s right around the corner, you know. We have some cards at the register if you want to pick one out.”
“That’s okay, I’ve already got a card.” I couldn’t imagine ever giving Shannon a card for any reason. I was tempted to ask “how right around the corner” Valentine’s Day was. But at least now I had a better idea of what month we were in.
June took the lingerie to the register and rang it up. She quirked a brow briefly at my shopping with cash, but it was probably just more nosiness. With a card she could learn my name. Without one, I was still a mystery. I was surprised she hadn’t just gone ahead and asked. Maybe I should have offered a name. I wasn’t sure about the small town meet-and-greet protocol.
She carefully wrapped the lingerie in tissue paper and put it in an elegant black paper bag with shiny silver accents. Then she added some additional gray tissue paper in the top, tied the handles together with some curling ribbon, and handed it to me like it was the holy grail.
“Have fun,” she said, winking at me.
I looked at my receipt. The date was February third. Okay then, another piece of the what the hell is happening in the real world puzzle solved.
I stopped in a few other shops on the block and got some apple cinnamon bubble bath which I felt tempted to just go ahead and eat instead of bathe in—it smelled that real. Then I grabbed a few fashion magazines and some stationery and a roll of stamps and some fat white candles.
Finally, I stopped at the corner grocery and got a few snacks I missed now that I remembered I liked them... like kettle corn drizzled in dark chocolate and a bottle of Merlot.
Since I didn’t have a car, I stopped buying things at this point. I still had to carry it all back.
It was tricky figuring how to get everything back up into the house since I couldn’t use the front door. The security system was like an extra lock. If you didn’t know the code, it didn’t matter whether you had a key or not. It wouldn’t just sound an alarm, the door or window wouldn’t even open. The balcony door was therefore the only door I could still get into.
I ended up having to throw the bags one at a time onto the balcony from the ground. Except the Merlot, which I carried up. I was glad there were some trees around the house and that Shannon’s nearest neighbor was more than a block down the road. I didn’t need anyone asking why I was tossing stuff up onto a balcony, or climbing the trellis to get inside the house. I looked like a really inefficient cat burglar. And even from my perspective—knowing the back story—the whole thing seemed absurd.