Amber notices the plate in my hand. “At least let Carol finish her lunch, hon,” she says. “Lily and I can go home with you.”
“No!” he says. “You come with me and let Carol take her.” He gestures to the baby as if he’s swatting a fly.
Might as well bust his chops a little.
“You don’t want Lily in your car?” I ask.
“New rule. Not while she’s still in diapers,” he says. The corners of his lips slide down in disgust. I guess a BMW trounces a BM.
Ben pulls car keys out of his pocket and jiggles them in his hand as he wanders off toward his car. Amber walks over to hug Felicia and Paulo goodbye, but Ben doesn’t wait. Nice guy, thishonof hers.
Ben is a big fan of black T-shirts. But I can’t wait to see how he looks in orange.
CHAPTER 42
A WOMAN IS SITTING on a sofa, sniffing a leather pocketbook.
That sounds like the beginning of a joke. It isn’t. The woman is Amber, dressed in her favorite white tennis outfit with a lime-green sweater draped across her shoulders and her hair in a ponytail.
I thought she was on her way to a lesson today. Instead, she’s on the couch turning the leather purse over in her hands, smelling all sides of it. Then she opens it and inhales the inside, then the clasp and the strap. She sees me watching her. She frowns.
“Do you know how to get a yucky smell out of leather?” she asks.
“Uh, no.”
“I’ve had this bag since… well, forever,” she says. “It’s been in my closet. But now there’s a kind of musty smell. Like it’s been hanging around a thrift shop.”
That surprises me. Not that the leather scent is off. But that Amber would know how a thrift shop smells.
Like everything else she owns, the bag looks expensive. Maybe crocodile or alligator, definitely some sort of endangered species that gave its life for her. Looking for advice on what to do, Amber takes out her cell and scrolls for a while, eyebrows wrinkled, deep in thought.
“Hmm,” she says. “It’s so confusing. Some websites say to rub it with alcohol and warm water. Others say alcohol can ruin the leather, and I should put charcoal briquettes inside. Or put it in a plastic bag full of baking soda and let it sit for several hours. I don’t know.”
Clearly, this decision is weighing heavily on her mind.
“Guess I’ll try the baking soda.”
She goes to her Sub-Zero refrigerator, takes out the Arm & Hammer box, and sprinkles half of it in a plastic bag. Then adds the pocketbook, zips the bag closed, and shakes it to disperse the powder. She stares at it for a minute in silence.
Then she bursts into tears. “I can’t do this anymore,” she says.
“Don’t worry,” I say. “There are leather repair shops that can—”
But she’s shaking her head. “It’s not the bag,” she says. “It’s…”
She leaves the sentence unfinished, then slams her tennis racket against the wall. Is she talking about tennis lessons?
“I really liked him in the beginning,” she says between sobs, grabbing a tissue and blowing her nose.
Oh. It’s not the lessons. It’s Ben.
“He was so nice. And nobody knew about us. We wanted to keep it a secret.”
Wait. Is she talking about her tennisinstructor,a handsome ex-lifeguard who, according to club gossip, is known as Bud the Stud? Did something happen between them?
“Is it always like this?” she asks.
“Like what?” I say.
