Getting Rid of Bradley Read online

  “That’s not spontaneous, that’s irresponsible.”

  “Fine, then do something irresponsible. In fact, do something spontaneous and irresponsible. Do something just because you have the urge to do it, because it feels good. Do something selfish, just for you.”

  Lucy’s eyes went back to the dark-haired man across the room. “I don’t think so.” She stabbed her salad again.

  “How do you know unless you’ve tried it? You’ve never done anything selfish in your life.”

  “Well, you know, I did,” Lucy said slowly, her fork frozen in her hand. “Once. In fact, I think that’s the real reason why I married Bradley. I dated Bradley because of the second law, but I think I married Bradley to get my house.”

  Tina looked interested. “Really? That’s so unlike you.”

  Lucy nodded. “I think I just convinced myself I loved him because he offered me the house.” She poked at her salad again, averting her eyes from Tina. “I love the house more than I ever loved Bradley. I think he knew it finally, and that’s why he cheated on me.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned.” Tina put her cigarette out and leaned back in the booth. “This explains a lot. Is this what that fight you had last October was about?”

  “How did you know...?”

  “That’s when you moved upstairs to the attic bedroom. I never bought that story about Bradley snoring. I knew there had been a fight.”

  “No.” Lucy frowned. “There wasn’t. We never fought. We just had a...disagreement. Over one of the dogs.”

  Tina winced. “For anyone else that would be a minor disagreement. For you...if Bradley did something to one of those dogs, he couldn’t have known you very well. And this explains why you’re not brokenhearted over the divorce. You’re upset, but it’s not because you miss Bradley. You’re glad he’s gone, aren’t you?”

  “Yes,” Lucy whispered. “That’s awful, but I am.”

  “No, it’s not. That’s healthy. What I don’t understand is what you’re so upset about. You’re free. You can do anything you want. What’s wrong with you?”

  “I feel stupid,” Lucy said.

  “What?” Tina leaned forward. “You? You’ve got more brains than...”

  “Not real-life brains. I have science brains. But real life?” Lucy shook her head. “I don’t even know what happened in my marriage. I know it was awful for me, but I would have sworn to you that Bradley was happy and he loved me, and then out of the blue, I come home and find him with a blonde. In my house. And she says they’ve been having an affair in my bedroom, and he flusters around, obviously guilty, and when I get upset, he leaves.” She sat back. “He just leaves.”

  “Men,” Tina said.

  “So I don’t have a clue where I went wrong. The only thing I’ve ever known for sure in my whole life is that I’m smart. And now I’m not even sure about that. It’s upsetting.”

  “Well, if you think he was angry about the house...”

  “It’s not just that he cheated on me. It’s that he won’t talk to me now. In the lawyer’s office, all he said was, ‘Is this what you want?’ And I said yes, because it was, but...” Lucy bit her lip. “He hasn’t even come by to pick up the rest of his papers and things. It’s like a chunk of my life just dropped out of sight.”

  “Oh.” Tina shifted uncomfortably. “Well, I may have had something to do with that.”

  Lucy froze. “What did you do?”

  “Well. You know how upset you were when you called me that day and told me that Bradley and the blonde had just been there?”

  “What did you do?”

  “Well, I had the new locks put on....”

  Lucy nodded. “What else did you do?”

  “Well, when he came to the door to talk to you...”

  “He came to the door to talk to me?”

  “You were upstairs in your bedroom crying.” Tina paused. “I was...angry.”

  “Oh, no.”

  “I know, I know. I lose it when I get angry.” Tina lit another cigarette, inhaled, and blew out another stream of smoke before she went on, faster now to get it over with. “Anyway, I told him that if he ever tried to talk to you again, I would have private detectives digging up every slimy thing he’d ever done, and that I would personally see that they all made the front page of the Inquirer, and that I would also find every asset he possessed and take it from him.”

  Lucy looked at her, stunned.

  “I think I might also have mentioned bodily harm. I was really upset. You never cry.”

  “So that’s why he hasn’t called? You are something else, Tina.”

  “I’m sorry,” Tina said. “But I could just see him talking you back into that damn marriage. I couldn’t stand seeing you unhappy anymore.”

  “I wouldn’t have gone back. But I would have liked to have talked to him.” Lucy took a deep breath. “I love you, Tine, and I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, but you’ve got to get out of my life. It’s my life.”

  “I know, honey.” Tina fiddled with her cigarette. “But you need help. I mean, I let you pick the restaurant and look where we ended up.” She glanced around at the plastic walls and the chipped Formica. “This place is a dump.”

  “I had a reason for wanting to come here,” Lucy said. “Bradley wrote to me. He said if I’d have lunch here with him, he could explain everything.” Lucy looked around the cheap diner again, perplexed. “It doesn’t seem like his kind of place.”

  “Do you want him back?” Tina asked. “I’ll get him back if that’s what you want.”

  “No.” Lucy pressed her lips together and stabbed her salad again. “That’s not what I want.”

  “Well, what do you want? Just tell me what you want I’ll make it happen.”

  Lucy smacked her fork down. “You can’t Or you won’t I want to live my own life. I want to make my own mistakes. I want you to be my sister, not my keeper. You don’t have to take care of me.”

  “I know I don’t have to.” Tina frowned. “But I want to. I want you to be happy. You never have any fun.”

  “I don’t want to have fun.” Lucy took a deep breath. “Do you know what I want?”

  Tina shook her head, her eyes on Lucy.

  “I want to be independent. I want to take care of myself, without you racing to the rescue with money and lawyers. You always tell me what to do, and you’re always right, and most of the time I don’t mind it, but then I married Bradley, and he was worse than you are. Between you and Bradley, I haven’t made a decision on my own in almost a year because everything you told me to do was the sensible thing, and it would have been stupid for me to argue. Only I did all the sensible things, and now look at my life. It’s a mess.” Lucy stuck her chin out. “So, I’m changing. I want to make my own mistakes and mop up after them myself. I want to talk to my ex-husband without you threatening him with death. And if I want to dye my hair purple or adopt another ten dogs or...or...” Her eyes twitched to the man across the room. “Or go out with inappropriate men. I want you to stay out. It’s my life. I want it back.”

  “Oh.”

  “I appreciate everything you’ve done for me. Just stop doing it.”

  “All right.” Tina picked a cucumber slice out of Lucy’s salad. “Inappropriate men, huh?”

  Lucy slid down a little in her seat. “Probably not. That was just big talk.”

  “What about that guy across the room you keep looking at?”

  “Oh, no.” Lucy closed her eyes. “I’m that transparent?”

  “Well, he doesn’t seem to have noticed.” Tina glanced across the room. “He really is attractive, though. Your instincts aren’t so bad.”

  Lucy looked at the two men across the room again out of the corner of her eye. The one in the black was talking, his fingers slashing the air while he spoke.

  “He’s gorgeous,” Lucy said.

  “Actually, he looks a little dull. But if that’s what you want, let me see what I can do.” Tina started to get up. />
  “Dull?” Lucy said. “He looks insane.”

  Tina stopped. “You’re talking about the one in the tweed, not the one in the black leather, right? You can’t be serious about the black leather.”

  “It’s my fantasy,” Lucy said. “And sit down. You’re not going over there and embarrass me.”

  Tina sat down. “The black leather would not be good for you.”

  “I can’t tell you how tired I am of things that are good for me,” Lucy said.

  “I know.” Tina nodded sympathetically. “But that doesn’t mean you should commit emotional hari-kari. That guy is unstable.”

  Lucy’s eyes went back to the black leather. “Actually, you know, he’s just what you ordered. What I’m feeling for him is definitely spontaneous and irresponsible.”

  Tina looked at him and frowned. “Maybe if you just used him for the cheap thrill and then discarded him.”

  “I couldn’t do that.” Lucy tore her eyes away from him. “I could never do that. I’d better just concentrate on being independent without the inappropriate-man part.”

  But she looked back at the man in black leather one more time and sighed.

  “I CAN FEEL IT.” In the booth across the room, Zack tapped his fingers on the scarred table. “Bradley’s here. Or he’s been here. Or somebody he knows is here. Or...”

  Anthony leaned back. “All right. He’s here. So are we. But it’s been an hour and I’m getting bored, so just point him out to me, and we’ll arrest him and go. He’s disguised as one of those two women, right?”

  “Fine.” Zack glared at him. “Don’t help. I’ll do this without you. Fine.” He drummed his fingers on the table.

  “Zack, I want to get him as much as you do,” Anthony said patiently. “He’s thumbed his nose at every cop who’s tried to nail him in the last nine months. And the million and a half he’s traveling on is not chicken feed. But I need more than just one of your instincts to keep me in this dive any longer.”

  Zack slapped the table and then drummed his fingers again. “Look, we got an honest-to-God phone tip that he’d be here, and it’s the best thing we’ve got so far. It’s not like we have anything else on this thing. It’s not like—”

  “Zack,” Anthony interrupted him. “You’re driving me crazy.”

  “What? Oh. The fingers?” Zack stopped drumming on the table. “Sorry.”

  “No, not the fingers. Although that’s got to stop, too. No, it’s the way you’ve been acting lately.” Anthony shook his head slowly. “That was a bad moment today with Jerry. I thought you were really going to kick him.”

  “Me? Naw.” Zack paused. “Probably not.”

  “Exactly.” Anthony nailed him with a frown. “That’s what I’m talking about. The ‘probably’ part. And all this rambling about quitting. I don’t like it You’ve always been nuts. That’s fine. I can deal with nuts. But lately, you’ve been depressed nuts. I can’t deal with that.”

  “I’m not depressed.” Zack picked up a package of sugar, tore it savagely across the middle, and dumped it in his coffee. “I’m not elated right now, but I’m not depressed.”

  “You just decapitated a sugar packet. That should tell you something.”

  Zack stared at the mutilated packet and then tossed it on the table. “I’ll tell you something. I was really disappointed in old Jerry today. I mean, I felt sorry for the poor sap, and then he pulled a gun on us, and I thought damn, nobody’s decent anymore. And then he shot at us, and I was really mad.” Zack shook his head. “Sometimes I think there aren’t any decent people in the world anymore.” He tasted his coffee and frowned. “So maybe the job’s getting me down a little, but I’m not depressed.”

  “You are depressed.” Anthony spoke clearly and calmly, as if he were speaking to the mentally ill. “And your depression is affecting our work. I know what’s wrong.”

  Zack glared at him. “Have I ever mentioned how much I hate it that you were a psych minor? A minor, for cripes’ sake. With a minor, you’re not even allowed to psychoanalyze dogs.”

  “It’s because you’re worried about getting older. It started when you turned thirty-six.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” Zack turned his attention back to the restaurant. “Do those two women look guilty to you? There’s something strange about the blonde. I think it’s her hair. That hair is not real.”

  “Ever since your birthday, you’ve been snarling at the younger men on the force. And I have shoes older than the women you’ve been dating.” Anthony shook his head. “You are really transparent on this one.”

  Zack scowled at him. “It’s not age. Hell, you’re the same age I am.”

  “Yes, but I’m not depressed about it.”

  “Well, you should be.” Zack fiddled with his spoon, spattering the scarred tabletop with flecks of coffee. “Remember Falk, the old guy I started out on patrol with? There’s a kid on patrol with him right now.... I was in high school when he was born. He lived down the block from me.”

  “Zack, you’re thirty-six. These things happen. So there are people who are younger than you are. Deal with it.”

  “I’m not as fast as I used to be, either.” Zack dropped his voice. “When we play one on one? I’m slowing down. A lot.”

  “This is all in your mind. I haven’t noticed you getting any slower.”

  “That’s because you’re getting slower, too.”

  Anthony narrowed his eyes. “Do you mind if we keep this your depression? Personally, I am getting better, not older.”

  “You’re getting older. But you don’t care because you’ve always been the brains. Brains don’t age.”

  “Oh, fine. And that makes you what? The brawn?” Anthony leaned back and folded his arms. “I can take you anytime, turkey.”

  “No, I’m the instinct. Lightning-fast instinct.” Zack sent his eyes around the diner again before he turned back to Anthony. “But lately, I’m losing it. When we were chasing that guy on the fortieth floor yesterday? The one on the roof? For a minute, just for a minute, I thought, ‘This is nuts. I’m going to fall off a roof because somebody just boosted somebody else’s camcorder. It’s not worth it.’ And then today with Jerry? I kept looking at that damn desk, thinking, ‘That’s going to hurt when I have to go over it’ I kept hoping he’d surrender so I wouldn’t have to go over that damn desk. I tell you, I’m losing it.”

  “Look, lightning, you are not getting slower, you are not losing your instincts, and you are not going to die. You are just growing up. And, may I add, not a moment too soon.”

  “I’m serious—”

  “So am I.” Anthony pointed his finger at Zack, and Zack shut up. “You have been going ninety miles an hour ever since I met you eighteen years ago. I used to watch you and think, ‘How does he do that?’ and marvel. Then I grew up, and now I watch you and think, ‘Wry does he do that?’ You have nothing to prove to anybody, and you’re still acting like some hotshot TV cop.” Anthony leaned forward. “Not chasing the camcorder off the roof was good. It was a sign of maturity.”

  “Don’t say that word,” Zack said. “Maturity means death.”

  “It does not. What’s wrong with you?”

  Zack started drumming his fingers again. “I don’t know. Sometimes.... You know, my brothers are all married. They’ve got wives, they’ve got kids, they’ve got big houses, they’ve got responsibilities.” He scowled at Anthony. “It’s like they’re living death.”

  “I’ve met your family. They’re happy. What are you talking about?”

  “Responsibility,” Zack said. “Maturity. The minute I stopped chasing that camcorder, death said hello.”

  Anthony started to laugh. “I don’t believe this. You’ve always been a flake, but this, this is new. You know what you need?”

  “Nothing. I need nothing. I’ll be fine.”

  “You need to settle down. Look, you used to live for this job, but it’s not enough anymore. That’s good. But you look at your brothers,
and you want what they’ve got, and it scares you, so you become depressed instead. That’s bad. Face it. Maturity is not death. It’s just the next step in life. Most people encounter it sooner than you did, but you’ll do fine.” Anthony sipped his coffee. “You will have to change the kind of women you date, though.”

  “What’s wrong with the kind of women I date?”

  “They’re younger than your car, they carry knives, and they ride motorcycles naked on I-75.”

  “Well, they beat those plastic Yuppies you hang out with. What’s the latest one’s name? Cheryl? Please.” Zack rolled his eyes.

  “Cheryl has many fine qualities,” Anthony said without much enthusiasm.

  “Name one.”

  “She can read. Have you ever dated anyone literate?”

  “Look, I don’t want to date anybody right now.”

  “You’re not dating?” Anthony frowned at him. “There are no women in your life?”

  “I’m resting.” Zack leaned back in the booth and tapped his fingers on the cracked upholstery. “I’m concentrating on my career.”

  “Oh, good for you. So how long has it been since you... dated?”

  “New Year’s Eve.”

  I Anthony shook his head. “That’s two months. That alone could make you depressed.”

  “I’m not that depressed.” Zack’s tapping picked up speed. “Could we get off this please?”

  “All right, you’re not ready for a wife. Start small. Get a dog.”

  “A dog? A dog?” Zack slapped the table. “A dog. That’s all I need is some dopey dog with big sad eyes telepathically telling me he never sees me and where have I been?”

  “Zack...”

  “Besides, I had a dog once. I got him when I was three.”

  “Zack...”

  “I went away to college and he died. Dogs are a responsibility. You can’t leave them.”

  “You went away to college.” Anthony cast an imploring look at the ceiling. “I don’t believe this. Zack, if you got him when you were three, he was fifteen by the time you went to college. That’s 105 in dog years. He died because he was old, not because you went to college.”