“He started off by just acting distant,” mom said. “I figured he had something on his mind, but thought he’d talk about it eventually. I was married to a cop long enough to know when to let things simmer and when to poke and prod.
“But Vince isn’t like Charlie. He’s always been very open about his life and career. I mean, we’ve known each other thirty years, so he was really just filling in a lot of the blanks. I’ve not really touched your father’s office since he died, but I did go in a few years ago and box up all his old papers and anything personal, and I shoved it in the closet.
“Vince decided to turn the room into his man cave, so he started cleaning things out and getting his electronics set up.”
Porn, I saw Rosemarie mouth out of the corner of my eye, but I kept my attention on my mother.
“I mean, Vince and Charlie were as close as brothers for a lot of years,” mom said. “So I figured he started seeing all of Charlie’s stuff and it made him sad. Vince even slept in the office that night. He completely shut me out.
“I thought everything had gone back to normal when he took all of your father’s things and put them out in the shed with his other stuff. Lord, Charlie was a packrat. He had boxes of old case files, body armor, bullets, guns…you name it. If they made something new for law enforcement, then he had to have it. It’s all out there.”
“You’ve got guns in the shed?” I asked, wide eyed.
“Don’t worry,” she said, waving a hand. “I’ve got plenty in here too. You can never be too careful with all the lunatics and perverts running around. I ran one of those sex offender searches on the computer, and you can throw a rock and hit one.”
“What if all the perverts storm the shed and plan an attack on the house?” I asked. “Is it at least locked?”
“Of course it is,” she said. “That was your dad’s man cave before man caves were a thing. He never let anyone in there who wasn’t a cop. Even after he died I never touched the place because I was afraid he’d come back and haunt me. I was thinking about just burning the whole thing to the ground and letting insurance pay to build me a she shed. I’d like a private place to do my morning yoga and drink my afternoon wine.”
“I’ve got a she shed,” Suzanne said, pressing her lips together primly and cutting more cake slices. “Except mine has a pool table and a flat-screen TV.”
“And a pinball machine,” Rosemarie said. “You always did have all the good toys.”
“Don’t you know it, sugar,” Suzanne said, winking at Rosemarie.
Seriously, I was going to have to delve into their history a little more once my mother wasn’t having a crisis. Because there was some definite chemistry between the two.
My mother sipped at her amaretto and stared out the window forlornly. Scarlet had found a bag of celery and was dipping it in a jar of peanut butter, and she passed them over to me. I hated to say it, but I needed a break from cake.
“What happened next?” I asked my mom.
“We just started drifting apart,” she said. “It’s like he decided to start living his own life and leave me out of it. Then he started taking these little trips. Weekend camping trips with the boys. A drive to Biloxi to hit the casinos. A trip to watch a basketball game. Stuff like that. And then he told me one of the cops who was friends with him and your dad was really sick and in the hospital, so he took off for four days to go visit him.”
“Ugh,” Rosemarie said, shaking her head. “I heard the same kind of lies from Roger. I knew from the start he was lying and cheating on me. It’s in a wife’s DNA to know. The second he dipped that wick it was like a switch had been flipped.”
“Roger was a horse’s ass,” Suzanne said. “I told you not to marry him.”
“Everyone told me not to marry him,” Rosemarie said. “But I was looking for an escape and I found it.”
“It’s when they stop having sex with you that you really know something is up,” Suzanne said.
My mother nodded in agreement. “Nothing but excuse after excuse,” she said. “Not tonight, Phyllis, I’m too tired.” She rolled her eyes. “Or my favorite, Put your clothes back on, we’re in public.” I tried to keep my expression blank, but I wasn’t sure I was succeeding. “That’s when I knew something was wrong. That man has never told me to put my clothes back on in his life. I don’t do yoga for nothing, you know.”
“Age only improves your skills,” Rosemarie said wisely. “These middle-aged men don’t know what they’re missing with those toothpick twenty-year-olds. I love dating older men. Older men know all kinds of things.”
“Meh,” Scarlet said. “They’re good for sex, but if you get them too old then they just want to boss you around. My first husband was thirty years older than me. He taught me the ways of the world and where my G-spot was. I always say that every husband has a purpose. Of course, I’m only into shacking up now. There’s not too many men older than me, and all the rules have changed. I don’t want anyone to marry me for my money. Look at what happened to Elizabeth Taylor.”
“I bet you went crazy once he started holding out,” Suzanne said. “There’s nothing like a woman scorned. They can dig up information on anybody.”
My mother nodded. “You pick up things after being a cop’s wife for more than twenty years. I went through his social media accounts and his phone records, but he’s not really a social
