Free Love in E Flat by Kate Sweeney Page A

moment. Lou didn’t know what to say. Mercifully, Edie ended the conversation. “Enough of this for tonight. Get some sleep. Good night, you nut.”
    “Good night, Edie. I love you. Tell John…”
    “I will,” Edie whispered and hung up.
    *******
    After a quick hot shower, Lou crawled into bed and cuddled the quilt around her. She felt horrible for Edie and John. Why? she thought. Why did this have to happen to two people who loved each other and wanted to have kids?
    She punched her pillow, trying to get comfortable. She could understand why her life turned out the way it had—she deserved it. She brought it on herself, and worse, she brought it on someone else, as well. She avoided Agata’s questions for a simple reason: She’d have to explain her mistakes, and Lou would avoid that at all costs. Lou had done this many, many times since it happened. Conceal it, hide it, pretend it never happened, and put it far away in her mind where forgotten things belonged.
    The problem was it was never forgotten. It was always there in Lou’s face reminding her of her shallowness, her arrogance, and just how immature a person could be. It was a hard lesson she learned. And that alone would have been just fine, but it was all the other people her folly affected. All the other lives that were forever changed because of her. “Okay. Cut the melodrama and go to sleep.”
    Lou tossed and turned until sleep finally came.

 

    Chapter 8

    The alarm clock nearly found the bedroom wall. Lou groaned and placed the clock none too gently on the nightstand before she crawled out of bed. It was nine o’clock, and on another day, she’d already be at the paper. “Too much merriment last night.” She stretched as she sat on the edge of the bed, glancing at Nick’s card on the nightstand. She dialed his number—he was far too chipper.
    “Sure, Lou. I just got my coffee. I can be there.”
    “Great, thanks, Nick.” Lou snapped the phone shut. She liked Nick, but she worried about getting too close; it was common for someone who lived and worked in downtown Chicago not to have a car. Still, Lou didn’t want Nick to become too familiar to ask. “Mark Twain was so right. Familiarity breeds contempt.”
    The hot shower revived her as she dressed, grabbed her coat and her laptop bag, and ran out the door.
    “So where to?” Nick asked as Lou climbed in the backseat. “The nice Russian woman?” He wriggled his eyebrows.
    “Yes. And why the look?” she asked as he pulled away from the curb.
    “No offense. She seems nice, that’s all.”
    “Uh-huh,” Lou said warily.
    Nick laughed and drank his coffee. “What? Don’t ya think she’s nice?”
    “Yes.”
    “And pretty sexy-looking.”
    “Nick, watch the road.” Lou looked out the window. “And why would I care?”
    “One hears rumors bein’ a cabbie.”
    Lou looked in the rearview mirror; Nick’s dark eyes danced as he looked at her.
    “And just what rumors have you heard?”
    He shrugged as he honked at a pedestrian. “Ya wanna get killed?” he yelled though his window was closed and the man probably didn’t hear him. Nick looked satisfied as he turned left. “Now what were we…? Oh, yeah, rumors. Well, I heard, and not that I care…”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “I heard you liked the ladies. And you took her to that classy bar last night. True?”
    “True.” Lou laughed as she watched several people jump back onto the curb as Nick drove by.
    “So my great detective mind figures…” He shrugged and watched the traffic.
    “And you don’t care?”
    Nick shook his head. “Don’t give a tinker’s damn, as my father used to say.”
    Lou felt Nick watching her. “Can I ask ya a question?” He stopped at the red light and turned to her.
    “Maybe.”
    He laughed. “I heard you were supposed to be on the USA soccer team a long time ago. They say you were hot stuff, a long time ago.”
    “A long time ago, yes.”
    “You’re not that old, what in your