Puppet by Joy Fielding Read Free Book Online Page B

sequence of events as described by the defendant to realize that if Derek Clemens had indeed been standing behind Caroline Fletcher, and she was pulling on his hair in the manner he claimed, his mouth wouldn’t have been able to reach much below her shoulders, let alone all the way down to
the middle of her back.
Such an act was simply impossible unless he was directly on top of her.
    Of course Amanda wasn’t about to challenge her own witness.
    “So, have you found a dress for the wedding?” Ellie is asking. Eager hazel eyes open wide with expectation. Soft amber waves frame round, dimpled cheeks.
    “Not yet.” Amanda looks down the busy main street. They are sitting in the open front window of the Big City Tavern on Clematis watching a desultory parade of tourists stroll by. A soft breeze plays lazily with the ends of the paper tablecloths. The temperature sits on the welcome side of eighty. Another perfect day in south Florida, Amanda thinks, feeling vaguely guilty for not enjoying it more.
    “What do you mean, not yet? What are you waiting for?”
    “The wedding isn’t till June,” Amanda reminds her friend gently.
    “Which is practically around the corner. Oh, my God. Don’t turn around.”
    Instinctively Amanda swivels around in her seat. “Shit,” she mutters under her breath, watching Sean Travis approach, his arm draped protectively around his new wife. Shit, shit, shit, she thinks, groaning audibly as he spots her. What are the odds? Two ex-husbands in as many days. Did her secretary forget to remind her it was National Ex-Husbands Week?
    “Amanda,” Sean acknowledges, his arm tightening around his young wife.
    “Sean, how are you?”
    “Well. And you?”
    “Well,” she replies. “You remember Ellie.”
    “Of course. How are you?”
    “Well.”
    Well, well, well, Amanda thinks. “You must be Jennifer.” She studies her former husband and his new wife dispassionately, finding the woman’s black hair and gray eyes a nice compliment to Sean’s graying hair and black eyes.
    The new wife shakes Amanda’s hand, then rests it on the slight bulge of her stomach.
    “We’re due in July,” Sean says proudly, noticing the direction of Amanda’s gaze.
    “Congratulations,” she offers sincerely.
    “We can’t wait,” Jennifer trills.
    “Well, nice seeing you,” Sean tells Amanda, sounding as if he means it. “Enjoy your lunch.”
    “Good luck,” Amanda calls after them.
    “Bastard,” Ellie bristles. “Rubbing her pregnancy in your face like that.”
    “I don’t think he meant to do that.”
    Ellie shrugs. The shrug says she isn’t convinced.
    “I’m the one who didn’t want children, Ellie.”
    “Which I’ll never understand. You’d be a great mom.”
    “Yeah, right. I had such a good example.” Amanda pictures her mother sitting in a Toronto jail cell, then immediately banishes the unwanted image. Stubborn traces of the woman cling to the periphery of her mind’s eye as she debates whether to tell Ellie about Ben’s phone call. When Amanda finally opens her mouth to speak, she realizes Ellie is already midsentence. “I’m sorry, what?”
    “I said, how did it feel, seeing Sean again?”
    Amanda shrugs the last vestige of her mother aside. “A little strange, I guess. It’s weird to think you have nothing to say to someone you once thought you’d spend the rest of your life with.”
    “Any regrets?”
    “Lots of them,” Amanda admits with a sigh. “I wasn’t a very good wife.”
    “It just wasn’t a very good match, that’s all.”
    Amanda smiles warmly at her friend. “That was sweet. Thank you.”
    “It’s the truth. Sean Travis may be a very nice man, but he was never the man for you.”
    Amanda sees Ben Myers lurking in the shadows of her vision and tries blinking him away.
    “Are you all right?”
    “I’m fine.”
    “You look like there’s something you want to tell me.”
    “Tell you?”
Well, all right. Since you asked. I got a rather disturbing