“Hey Braden! Are you done with your phone sex yet?”
“You can come in!” Braden called out. I thought I heard a door close. “I didn’t expect to see you back here tonight.”
“I gotta sleep, man. Besides, I couldn’t remember her name and it felt kind of awkward after she gave me such a great…”
“Still on the phone here, dude,” Braden interrupted.
“You’re still on the f**king phone? You just saw her this morning. You might as well just hand her your balls right now.” Then in a louder voice he called out, “Hi Gabrielle!”
“Please tell Adam that I said hello and that I can hear him even when he’s not shouting.”
“She said hello and she can hear everything you’re saying.”
“Terrific. So your girlfriend knows that I’m a dick.”
“She knew that that already,” Braden replied.
“Did you tell her you missed her?”
“I think I got this, Adam.”
“Did you tell you love her?”
“I really don’t need your help here.”
“Ah, Braden’s in love,” Adam teased. “All the women at the G Lounge are probably crying into their vodka.”
“Will you please go occupy yourself somehow? Take a shower, brush your teeth, study the Crimes Code. Just leave me alone for a minute so I can say goodnight to my girlfriend.”
“Goodnight Gabrielle!” Adam called out.
“I’m sorry about that,” Braden apologized.
“Don’t worry about it. I’m not dating him. Listen, I’m going out with Jess, Cam and Mark tomorrow night. I’m not sure what time I’ll be home.”
“Call me no matter what time. And text me or call whenever you want during the day. I might even be able to wrap up early tomorrow. If I can maybe I’ll switch to an earlier flight.”
“Okay, I will.”
“I should say goodnight while he’s still in the bathroom, because I do really want to tell you that I miss you.” He hesitated for a second. “And that I love you.” Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. He said it! Calm, Gabrielle. My heart started hammering. I wanted so much to be with him at that moment.
“I miss you and I love you too.” My voice shook a little because the emotions I was experiencing were so powerful that they almost overwhelmed me. “So much.”
“Goodnight, baby.”
“Goodnight. Sweet dreams
* * *
The next day at noon Mark sat in our living room listening while I laid out the whole story. I told him about the notes, the suspects, and our efforts thus far to collect evidence. Then I laid out the plan. Finally, I paused and Mark spoke up.
“So, let me get this straight. You met three obnoxious people at Braden’s fundraiser, and when you got a couple of anonymous notes saying that you should break up with him, or something bad might happen, you assumed that one of those three wrote them.”
“Because while each one of them had an interest in seeing us break up, nobody else did, and it wasn’t common knowledge that we were dating then.”
“So, instead of just telling the cops, and letting them handle it, you decided instead to try to get handwriting samples yourself, because you were worried that there would be a backlash if you said you suspected one of these people.”
“Right.”
“And in pursuit of that evidence you convinced Fred and Ethel here to follow private citizens and dig through garbage with you.” He glanced at Jess and Cam like he wondered just what in the hell was wrong with them.
“Well, yeah. You know I’m mostly doing this because I don’t want Braden or my parents to worry anymore, right?”
“Uh huh. And now you want me to wear a costume and go to an underground sex party with you so that Jess can dominate some kinky politician into giving her a sample of his handwriting.”
“It’s for a good cause.”
“And you think that one of my closest friends, who also happens to be your boyfriend, is going to think that there’s nothing wrong with this plan?”
“I’m not going there to have sex with anybody! I’m not even going in. I think this guy will actually do this if Jess even just orders him to. As soon as she gets the writing we’re gone. I send it to my expert, he either eliminates Cole or gives me ammunition to tell him to leave me the hell alone. This is a way to possibly get someone to stop harassing me without dragging Braden or his family into it.”
“Don’t even try to make this sound reasonable, Gabrielle. I can’t believe that you didn’t tell Braden about the first note.”
“Mark, I don’t want him to get himself into a difficult position. If I just had a little something to back up my suspicions it would be a whole different story. Don’t you understand? I’m doing this because I care about him. I don’t want him worrying about me all the time and I want people to leave us alone without getting him sued.”
“What if we get this sample and it’s not this guy. What then?”
“I don’t know. I’m not sure I’m up to digging through trash again. I think I’ll just give it this one try. He’s the one who it would be most controversial to wrongly accuse anyway. If it isn’t him I’ll just probably turn everything over to the cops and let them deal with it.”
“And you’re going to tell Braden about all of this?”
“Yes – I will.”
“I still don’t think that he’s going to be okay with you doing this.”
“I can’t just make Jess do this herself.”
“Okay look, I’ll go along with this under one condition. Even though you may be dressed up to blend in you stay back unless absolutely necessary. I don’t want you anywhere near this place unless we have no other choice. We can stay in communication with each other by cell.”
“Okay, it’s a deal. We’ll park a few blocks away and we’ll stay in the car unless you need us.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
That night at eight forty-five, we were all dressed in our best fantasy wear from Tony’s. Jess and Mark made quite a pair. She was wearing a skin-tight skirt that came down to her ankles but was slit up the back almost to her bottom. She had on a high-necked old-fashioned-looking ruffled blouse like a Victorian school teacher might wear, fishnets, boots with high heels, a black wig and a Mardi Gras-type mask. She was carrying a ruler and she had some folded paper and a pen stuck into a garter. Mark also wore a mask but his was plainer – sort of Lone Ranger-esque. He was dressed like an English school boy in a striped tie, knee socks, matching shorts, blazer and cap. He looked like that guy Angus Young from the band ACDC. Cam and I just looked kinky.