Angelina Bonaparte Mysteries Box Set by Nanci Rathbun (surface ebook reader TXT) 📗

The Miata, like my condo, was a gift to myself following my divorce. The decree restored both my self-respect and my maiden name—Angelina Bonaparte, pronounced Boe-nah-par-tay, not Bo-nah-part. Napoleon was a Corsican-cum-French wannabe, so he left the last syllable off, but I’m one hundred percent Sicilian and I pronounce it the way it was meant to be pronounced.

I love my car. It symbolizes my post-marriage financial and emotional independence, and the sense of personal daring that I kept under tight wraps while I was Mrs. Bozo (I call him “your dad” when the kids are around, even though they’re grown and have their own kids). I still shudder to think of twenty-five prime years spent trying to fit the pattern of wife, lover, mother, housekeeper. Picture June Cleaver wearing a sassy red thong under her demure shirtwaist dress.

Bozo started playing around when he turned fifty. Funny, whenever I heard about some guy running around on his wife, I always told my best friend, Judy, that the door wouldn’t hit my butt on the way out. When it happened to me, though, I decided that I owed a twenty-five year marriage at least one chance. Or two. Three was when I changed the locks, packed his clothes and put the suitcases on the front lawn. I reminded him of Papa’s toast at our wedding—“There are no divorces in our family. There are widows, but no divorces.” It scared him purple.

Of course, we did divorce and I did manage to dissuade Papa from having Bozo fitted for lead sneakers, or seeing to it that his body was made unfit for further nookie. The Miata was my first indulgence after the proceedings. I went down to the dealer with a check in hand that very day. Then I put the house on the market and signed the papers for my East side high-rise condo. I heard the whispers about “middle-aged crazy” and “trying to prove something,” but I ignored them. This was me, the real me, not that convention that I’d tried to squeeze myself into all those years.

I stepped into my foyer and locked the door behind me. Shedding clothes as I walked, I tossed the dirty duds into my bedroom closet’s built-in hamper and walked naked into the bathroom. If driving the Miata is car heaven, standing under a steam shower with five heads massaging from toes to crown is surely water heaven.

Thirty minutes later, moisturized, gelled, dressed in yoga pants and a tee shirt, I sipped a glass of Chardonnay and stared into the fridge. Then I glared at the goods in the freezer. Why is it that there’s never anything to eat when you just want to stay in? It would have to be another deep dish Milwaukee special night—cheese, sausage, mushrooms, onions, the famous “SMO.” I was either going to have to step up my exercise program and cut back on the fat, or buy a bigger wardrobe. While I love shopping for clothes, the second option didn’t appeal. Bozo used to pinch my waist and smirk when he could get an inch between his fingers. I love to see him assess my figure now, when we attend family functions like birthdays and baptisms. There’s no way I’m gaining back that inch, so I resolved to do some grocery shopping soon. Just for good measure, I did twenty minutes of yoga/Pilates while waiting for the pizza. A couple chapters of the latest Sue Grafton (I love that Kinsey, but, jeez, one black dress for her whole adult life?) and I was ready to pound the pillow. Solo.

It’s been months since my last serious involvement. He thought I wouldn’t find out about the bar-time pickups. “Honest, Angie, it doesn’t mean a thing. I just like a little variety.” Sometimes I wish I was a lesbian, it would make life so much easier. I hear they’re more than ninety-percent faithful. What a concept!

I met Kevin, my current guy, four weeks ago. My neighbor Sally and her son, Joseph, introduced us. Joseph was diagnosed with Muscular Dystrophy at age six. Kevin is his physical therapist. Picture Harrison Ford as Han Solo in the first Star Wars movie—a little rough, killer body, redeeming lop-sided smile that gets him out of all sorts of trouble. He’s thirty-eight, so, yes, he’s a few years younger than I am. Given the actuarial tables and my energy level, that’s good.

We’ve been doing that painful boy-girl dance ever since, the one we all first learned in adolescence. Is he available? Cute enough? Is she needy? Pretty enough? Will he want to go to bed right away? Do I want to? Should I? Add today’s refinements —STDs? Last HIV test? Last lover? Ad infinitum. Ad nauseum. Even my best friend Judy is getting sick of me. “Just DO IT,” she yelled at me last week.

“Can’t,” I responded. “You know me.” She groaned. We’ve been through this a lot in the course of the five years since my divorce. I have this little hang-up. I won’t deal with dishonesty on a personal basis. Go figure, someone in my line of work! So I operate on the assumption that everyone is hiding something. I run credit checks and criminal and civil court searches on the men who ask me out. I watch them for signs of fooling around—scents they don’t normally wear, clothes changed in the middle of the day, long lunches when they can’t be called, lots of little clues that mean nothing and everything. I’m not proud of it, but I won’t be a fool again. I haven’t figured a way out of the morass that women and men seem to sink into. Most nights, like tonight, I sleep alone.

Chapter 2

Murder is unique in that it abolishes the party it injures, so that society has to take the place of the victim and on his behalf demand atonement or grant forgiveness; it is the one