Free Footprints in the Butter by Denise Dietz Page B

sheepskin jacket had been missing since yesterday. It wasn’t in the bedroom or the kitchen or the front hall closet. “Where is your jacket, Ben?”
    “At Patty’s house. She insisted on having it cleaned.”
    “Why? Did you roll around in the dirt?”
    “No. She threw up. I held her head. Then I did lead her back inside, and brewed some coffee.”
    “That’s the truth?”
    “I swear.”
    “Where was Wylie all this time?”
    “Working.”
    “He didn’t emerge once? Out of curiosity? I mean, we’re talking about a puking wife. Or had she finished?”
    “She finished at the kitchen sink. Christ, she’d downed five or six Bloody Marys. When I refused her, uh, generosity, she screamed bloody murder. It must have primed the pump. In the middle of a rather profane double-whammy, she erupted like a volcano.”
    “Lava mixed with Tabasco sauce. No wonder she insisted on having your jacket dry-cleaned.”
    “I thought she had finished, but when we reached the kitchen she started all over again. She was edgy, and it wasn’t me, or even the dance. I think she thought Wylie might continue his abuse from the night before.”
    “Abuse? What abuse? He exposed our hypocrisy, that’s all. Okay, here’s the scenario,” I said slowly. “Patty nude beneath your jacket, puking into the kitchen sink. You holding her head. Again. May I assume there was no background music?”
    “No, you may not assume. There was music. It came from Wylie’s studio. Very loud. That’s probably why he didn’t hear Patty.”
    “Ray Charles, right?”
    “No. Henry Mancini.”
    “Wylie was playing Mancini? Moon River Mancini? Never mind. What happened next?”
    “Patty showered and got dressed while I drank coffee. Then I drove her to the Dew Drop Inn.”
    “And all the time Patty washed and primped, you never said boo to Wylie?”
    “I guess I felt guilty.”
    “But you’ve just sworn that Patty instigated the seduction. Nothing happened, you said.”
    “I felt a certain remorse, regardless.”
    Lifting the chopsticks to my lips, I realized that the shrimp rested between my cleavage and my waistline. Something smelled sour, and it wasn’t my saucy breasts.
    “Ben, are you absolutely certain that Wylie was working inside his studio?”
    “Well, I never actually saw him. Why do you ask?”
    “The music and—wait a sec! Why did you drive Patty to the Dew Drop? Where was her car?”
    “In the garage. I drove because I wanted to watch the football game, I knew the reunion crowd was planning to meet there, and Patty still looked a tad green around the gills. What’s your point?”
    “A thief thought the house was vacant because Patty had the rental car.”
    “She didn’t, Ingrid. I drove us. But if the car was in the garage, a thief might still believe it was gone.”
    I tried focusing on a thought that wouldn’t stay put. “Did Patty say good-bye to Wylie?”
    “Of course. I heard her. She even kissed him.”
    “How do you know?”
    “Her lipstick was smeared.”
    With a shrug, I returned to the couch. “C’mere, Hitchcock, good dog.”
    My ganglionic mutt wagged his tail, and every other portion of his body, as he bounded across the room, skidded to a halt, and snuffled my sweet and sour blouse.
    “Sit, Hitchcock,” said Ben, joining us. “Stay! Leave Ingrid alone. You’re trespassing on my property.”
    “I’m not your property, Cassidy. My breasts are not your property, either.”
    “Who paid for the Chinese take-out, Beaumont?”
    “You did.”
    “Then I have proprietary rights, exclusive and absolute. For instance, that shrimp belongs to me.”
    Sitting, Ben pulled my body across his lap, unbuttoned the rest of my blouse, and captured the prawn with his teeth. Then he tossed the prawn toward Hitchcock.
    Hitchcock didn’t catch the shrimp, of course. Hitchcock couldn’t catch a rubber ball unless you wedged it between his jaw and muzzle. After sniffing the floor, he gulped it down in one swallow—the