Wrong Side of Forty Read online

  Wrong Side of Forty

  Jana DeLeon

  Copyright © 2020 by Jana DeLeon

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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  Paperback/eBook cover design by The Illustrated Author.

  www.theillustratedauthor.net

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  About the Author

  Paranormal Women’s Fiction

  Chapter One

  Marina Trahan dropped into the driver’s seat of her well-used Honda Accord and turned on the engine. Hot air blasted from the vents, making her feel as if she were in the middle of the desert rather than tucked away in Last Chance, a tiny bayou town in southeast Louisiana. The humidity, which sat at around a thousand percent, made it so hot and sticky that after even a minute outside, a person felt as if they’d gone five rounds with Mike Tyson. Young Mike Tyson. Before he’d married and lost his edge.

  She put the car in Drive and grabbed the steering wheel, then cursed and let go. She’d forgotten to put that thingy on her dashboard again, and the steering wheel felt like a skillet that had been sitting on high heat for an hour. She shook her hands, silently willing them to stop burning, then grabbed a bottle of water from her purse and dumped some of it on the steering wheel. Sitting here waiting for it to cool wasn’t an option. It was only August. She’d be waiting until October.

  With both herself and her steering wheel now dripping, she pulled out of the parking lot of the Cut & Curl, where she’d worked as a stylist for twenty-five years, and directed her vehicle onto Main Street and then into the cute little neighborhood of historic homes that occupied three blocks behind the center of town.

  Maybe that was her problem, she thought as she drove. She’d married and lost her edge. Of course, that was presuming she’d ever had an edge. And Harold wasn’t all that bad. Yes, he was balding, and had a spare tire around his waist that you could drive to Mississippi, and he preferred his tax returns and spreadsheets to a spirited discussion about most anything else, but he had a good CPA practice, and along with the money she made as a stylist, they had a comfortable lifestyle.

  Still, it seemed that everything she’d heard or read lately was about how to spice things up. Especially when the kids left home. They only had the one daughter, Avery, but she’d been the work of at least ten as far as Marina was concerned. Smart, bullheaded, and a raging extrovert, she’d kept Marina running until last week, when she’d driven off to the university in New Orleans. Marina had crawled into bed after she left and hadn’t come out for sixteen hours.

  But now, she and Harold had the house to themselves, and Marina had decided to take some of that advice she’d been hearing and ordered a slinky negligee. It was sapphire blue with black lace and of course, crotchless. When her last appointment of the day had canceled, Marina figured this was the golden opportunity to test out her new purchase. As soon as she got home, she was going to shower, style her hair, do up her makeup, slip into that silky garment, and greet Harold as he walked in the door. Just looking at the sexy nightie had made Marina flush a bit, so she was expecting great things when Harold caught sight of her in it.

  She pulled into the drive and was disappointed to see Harold’s shiny new Mercedes convertible already parked there. So much for the surprise. It was barely three in the afternoon and Harold wasn’t usually due home for another couple hours. But then maybe he was taking a really late lunch. Maybe he’d go back to the office soon and she could still put her plan in action.

  She headed inside to the kitchen, but there was no sign of her husband there. She started to call out when she heard a noise at the back of the house. Frowning, she headed down the hallway toward their bedroom. It would be her luck that the one day she’d gotten off early in a million years, Harold had come down with a stomach flu or something.

  She pushed open the door to the bedroom and gasped.

  Harold was indeed in bed, but he wasn’t alone. His part time file clerk, a girl only three years older than their daughter, was with him. Even worse, she was wearing Marina’s new negligee. Things would never be the same. Someone else’s crotch had been in her nightie and unfortunately, looked better in it than hers did.

  Chapter Two

  “I’ll cut his little winkie off!”

  Marina’s half sister, Halcyon, ranted as she stomped across her living room. It was fairly impressive, as she managed to do so with a full glass of red wine and wearing six-inch stilettos on thick white carpet. Halcyon preferred to make a statement, even if Marina was the only one to see it. If Marina had attempted the same move, that carpet would look like a scene from Forensic Files.

  “And I do mean little!” Halcyon continued. “I’ve seen that man’s feet. And that slut Chastity LeDoux—someone needs to superglue her privates shut. That girl has plowed through three-quarters of the male population. The only ones that she’s missed are either out of Viagra or gay.”

  “It does seem rather ironic, her parents naming her Chastity,” Marina said.

  Halcyon threw her arms in the air. “Might as well stick her on a pole as soon as she can walk. Putting a name like that on your kid is just asking to be defied.”

  “I don’t know. Dad named me Marina and I love the water.”

  “Dad named you Marina because he really wanted a new bass boat and couldn’t afford a new boat and two babies.”

  Marina stared. “How do you know that?”

  “I heard him tell it to Six-Pack Steve one night when they were drunk fishing.”

  “Did they catch anything?”

  “Hell from my mother.”

  “Was she upset that you overheard?”

  “No. She was upset that they drank the last of the beer.”

  Marina nodded. The truth was, neither she nor Halcyon had won the lottery in the mother department. They’d decided long ago to just be thankful their father had died young and hadn’t had a chance to subject more of his DNA to his questionable choices in women.

  At least they’d had each other. Their mothers had hated each other on sight, but Marina and Halcyon had always been thick as thieves, even though their personalities were nothing alike. Marina was the calm, polite one—and if she was willing to admit it, too accommodating. Halcyon constantly nagged her for it. Her sister was only six months older but she played the wiser-big-sister role to the hilt. Halcyon was nothing like her name. Marina was certain her mother, Constance, had named her in high hopes that the baby she got would be calm and peaceful. Constance only did drama if she was the one causing it. To her dismay, what she’d gotten was a hurricane on two legs.

  Halcyon stopped pacing and stared at Marina. “So what are you going to do? And why are you
here? Why did you leave your house? Attorneys advise against that.”

  “What was I supposed to do? Give her my good robe? Cook them dinner? I really don’t think I could have joined them for a cigarette and pillow talk.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. You should have thrown her stolen-silk-covered butt out into the street. Let everyone in town see just what kind of cad Harold is. Instead, you admitted defeat and let that witch take over your castle.”

  “But it’s not my castle, remember? Harold inherited that house. I don’t have any rights to it.”

  “That’s just bullshit. That place was a dump when Harold inherited it. It looked like a moldy rose garden had thrown up on every wall in the house. You put your time, money, and sweat into making it a showplace. Harold never lifted a finger to help.”

  “He did once. But since he almost cut that finger off with the table saw, he stuck to his spreadsheets afterward.”

  “Why doesn’t that surprise me? Look, the bottom line is that I don’t care if he inherited the house or not. You’re due something for all the money you poured into the place. He can’t just set you out like a stray cat.”

  “You think I should ask him for money?”

  “Damn straight! Marriage is personal. Divorce is business. So either he coughs up some equity or you and I pay a visit to Myrna.”

  “Why would we visit Myrna?”

  “Because her daughter is the editor of the local newspaper. Harold can give you a very generous payout, or he can be subjected to any number of articles about his proclivity for sleeping with an employee who went to high school with his daughter. Trust me, in this day and age, that is not a good look for a man.”

  “There are eight hundred people in this town. Seven hundred fifty of them probably already know and the other fifty will as soon as they sober up.”

  “Of course they know. I’m sure some of your nosy neighbors saw you NASCAR-drive out of there and put two and two together because they probably saw slutbag and Harold going in together earlier.”

  “Even if no one saw, Chastity will tell. Just for fun. That’s the way she is.”

  “True, but as it filters through the gossip train, the bunch of hypocrites that make up this town will all pretend they don’t know because anything else would be crass or worse, impolite. If you put it in front of their faces, however, then they have to take sides. And I’m guessing that Harold’s accounting business would be the big loser on that one.”

  “That’s harsh.”

  “You saw another woman’s hoo-ha in your nightie. That’s harsh.”

  Marina sighed.

  Halcyon narrowed her eyes at Marina. “You’re not thinking of taking him back, are you? Because even if that worm came crawling naked and carrying a solid gold rose in his teeth, I wouldn’t stick around long enough for anything but to kick those new veneers out.”

  “No. I’m just mad at myself. I mean, it’s not like I thought our marriage was great but, you know…I guess buying the nightie was too little, too late. I should have done something sooner, but I was so busy with Avery and work and the house, I just couldn’t find the time for anything else.”

  “You were busy being responsible and twice as busy as you had to be because you had no help. God knows, Harold has never been able to handle Avery, or cooking, or cleaning, or laundry, or even the smallest home repair. But here’s the thing—you thought things needed a pick-me-up, so you went out and bought a sexy nightie to wear for your husband. Your husband, however, let his hooker girlfriend wear your nightie. Do you see the glaring difference in how the two of you approached the problem?”

  “Of course. So why couldn’t he do something like me?”

  “Because he’s an idiot. Harold is looking for external solutions to an internal problem. It works in the short term but in the longer term, you only end up digging yourself a bigger hole. Trust me on that one. I have the permanent eyeliner and that disastrous boob tattoo to prove it.”

  “I just feel so stupid.”

  “Don’t. You were the one trying to do the right thing. God knows, I’d rather be subjected to medieval torture than see Harold naked, but you made those vows and you were doing your best to keep them going. Harold, on the other hand, just picked the easiest warm body he could get a hold of so that he could feel young again.”

  Marina frowned. “I never understood how that worked. How does being with someone that young make you feel young? Being around Avery always reminds me of how old I am. Those kids speak an entirely different language. I have no idea what she’s saying half the time, and don’t even get me started on all the shorthand in texts. You’d have to be a code-breaker for the CIA to figure them out.”

  “It doesn’t make logical sense. But this is a man we’re talking about. Well, Harold, anyway. The bottom line is you can’t blame yourself because this isn’t about you. It’s about him. When a man goes grasping at everything but his wife to solve his problems, there’s nothing left but the fallout.”

  Marina shook her head. Her marriage was over. She’d had an inkling that was the case for a while—the veneers, the new sporty Mercedes, refusing to eat bread any longer—but with Avery getting ready to leave, she’d stuffed everything into a closet and ignored it. Now, apparently, the closet door had burst open and all the pretending she’d been doing had bitch-slapped her right in the face.

  It was time for a come-to-Jesus. She was forty-eight years old and had a lackluster career, a high-maintenance daughter, a crazy mother, and a husband who’d just made her the biggest fool in town—no easy task.

  Her midlife crisis had officially begun.

  Chapter Three

  Marina groaned and pulled the covers over her head as the sunlight hit her face. Why hadn’t she remembered to close the shades the night before?

  Because you were stinking drunk, that’s why.

  She needed to add drinking like a sailor along with talking like a sailor to her sister’s list of talents. And Halcyon definitely knew how to bring someone along for the ride. Marina had no idea how many times her sister had refilled her glass. She’d lost count—and complete feeling in her face—around midnight.

  Figuring there was no way she was getting back to sleep at that point, she threw back the covers, her mind already racing with the multitude of things she needed to do, decisions she needed to make. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and popped upright, then grabbed her head and groaned. The room started to spin, and she drew in a deep breath and slowly blew it out.

  She was too old for this shit.

  But then, she was too old for a lot of shit she was about to face…being broke, being homeless, being single on national holidays. It was as though she was twenty years old all over again, except with forty extra pounds, wrinkles, and too many gray hairs to count. She even had the high school hangover to go along with the rest of the list of undesirable things in her life.

  She pushed herself off the bed and staggered into the bathroom, almost afraid to look at herself in the mirror. The night before, when she’d changed clothes, she’d realized just how big and dark the circles under her eyes were. How puffy and loose the skin was when she poked at it. How had she failed to notice this? She looked as if she’d been ill for a long time. This morning, she was probably going to look as if she’d rolled over and died.

  Quite frankly, she still wasn’t convinced she hadn’t.

  “Think positive,” she said out loud. “If your reflection doesn’t appear, you’re either dead or a vampire.”

  She flipped on the bathroom light and positioned herself in front of the sink, then slowly lifted her head. Her eyes widened, then squinted. She lifted a finger and ran it under one eye. The dark circles were almost completely gone. And the skin was firm, not even remotely puffy. What the hell? She’d always been told drinking would make her skin worse. Obviously she’d been lied to all these years. Or she was still drunk and wasn’t seeing things right. Either way, she’d take it. Especially given her first order of
business this morning.

  She headed into the kitchen to make a pot of coffee and when she poured the first cup, Halcyon came shuffling in, looking as if she’d been to war. Her long, blond, and usually straight hair was frizzy and sticking out in every direction. Apparently, she spent her nights scooting around her silk sheets, because the amount of static electricity she was carrying could probably power the coffeepot. Maybe even the toaster.

  “You want some coffee?” Marina asked.

  “Nope. Just a handful of aspirin and a Diet Coke. Then I’m going back to bed until next week.”

  She grabbed a bottle of aspirin and dumped a pile of it in her hand. Before Marina could caution against taking that many at once, Halcyon had popped the handful into her mouth and then stuck her entire head under the kitchen faucet to get a drink. Then she stood up, hair dripping with tap water, and stared at Marina.

  “What are you doing up this early?” Halcyon asked.

  “Couldn’t sleep any longer. I figured I might as well head over to the house and collect my things.”

  “You want me to come with you?”

  “No. You never liked Harold on his and your best days. I don’t want to have to involve the cops in this.”

  “Or the coroner.” She narrowed her eyes at Marina and took a step closer. “What kind of cream did you use on your eyes last night?”

  “Are you kidding me? I brushed my teeth this morning with my finger. I didn’t stop to pack a bag when I left yesterday. I just ran out and drove here like a maniac.”