Free Have Your Cake and Kill Him Too by Nancy Martin

kids and a swing set. Maybe one of those ducks on the porch—the kind you dress in doll clothes. What’s up with those, anyway?”
    â€œI don’t know.”
    He said more gently, “I’m glad you’re going to get the family you need.”
    â€œShut up,” I said. Taking a handful of his shirt, I pulled him back to me and kissed him until I felt emotion burn in the back of my throat. When I broke the kiss and looked up into his eyes, my vision blurred. “Sometimes I can’t believe it’s over between us.”
    â€œBelieve it.” He turned his head away. “It’s over.”
    â€œI still have the ring you gave me.”
    â€œSell it,” he said, unable to look at me anymore. “Hock it. You can use the money, right? Fix the roof on that house of yours.”
    His voice had turned cold.
    I turned him loose and fumbled to get the door open. He helped, and we were out in the hallway again, no need to speak anymore. He put his tie right, and I quickly went up the hall to escape the best thing that had ever happened to either one of us, if only he could change who he really was.
    Something must have happened in the restaurant while we were gone. I came up the steps into the bar and found Delilah and Emma standing together looking wide-eyed and panicky.
    â€œHey,” I said. “What’s—”
    â€œWho the hell are you?” a female voice demanded—Jersey nasal and laced with toxic sarcasm.
    It was the woman who’d been sitting with Michael. Her lipstick was a shade that didn’t exist in nature, and her contact lenses glowed a poisonous green. In one long-taloned hand, she held the remains of a pink Cosmopolitan.
    â€œYou’re her, aren’t you?” she snapped. “The bitch he was sleeping with before me?”
    Delilah snorted at her unintentionally comic semantics, which only fanned the flames.
    â€œHello,” I said with extreme civility. “I’m Nora Blackbird.”
    She batted my hand away and shot a murderous look past my shoulder just as Michael came up the step behind me. Her face tightened with fury, and the next thing I knew she threw the Cosmopolitan in my eyes.
    Michael caught my arm and spun me behind him to prevent further mayhem, saying, “Darla, wait—”
    But it was Emma who flashed into action. She took a step and swung her fist. The punch connected perfectly, and we saw Darla’s eyes go blank and her knees wobble once before they crumpled completely out from under her.
    Which was the moment Richard came through the restaurant door. He caught his balance with his cane to better absorb the scene.
    Michael handed me his handkerchief and said curtly to Richard, “Take her home.”
    Which was how I ended up with Richard long before I figured out what I wanted to do about him.

Chapter 4
    In Richard’s car sopping up, I said, “My reflexes must be off. I never get hit with drinks.”
    Richard said, “You must have been distracted.”
    I heard his tone as I tucked the damp handkerchief into my bag. Clamping my knees together, I tried not to think about what I had just done in a phone booth with someone I truly hadn’t intended to see anymore. I had disgraced myself, and I felt ashamed.
    It was time to forget about Michael and focus on the new man in my life.
    Except he was sulking.
    â€œIs there something else you want to argue about, Richard?” I tried to make my tone light. “Or should we just cut directly to the big distraction himself?”
    â€œI don’t want to argue.”
    â€œThen tell me why you were at Cupcakes tonight. Did you have an urge for hot wings?”
    He didn’t bother trying to smile. “I went to Cupcakes to talk to Abruzzo.”
    â€œI see. So he’s a story you’re working on?”
    â€œHalf the city’s working on his story.” Richard took his eyes off the road long enough to glance at