My Favorite Mistake. Stephanie Bond

effort, I forced myself back to the present and to the photo in my hand. We were covered in confetti the witness had tossed on us through the open window. Redford was wearing a black sweatshirt. I couldn’t tell from the photo, but remembered that I’d been wearing a T-shirt with no bra, my hair messy and hanging around my shoulders, not a speck of makeup. Natural, hedonistic…what had I been thinking?

      In hindsight, I hadn’t been thinking—at least not beyond the next orgasm. Redford had been the first man to tap in to my sexuality and I’d been blinded by lust. I had mistaken enthusiasm for love.

      I did have a fourth picture, although not of our wedding. I carefully withdrew the framed 5x7 from the box, drinking in the sight of First Sergeant DeMoss in his dress uniform, achingly handsome in his official U.S. Marine Corps photo. He had given it to me somewhat sheepishly at the airport, and I had clutched it all the way back to New York. I ran my finger over his face, my heart full over my naiveté at the time.

      The phone rang and I picked up the handset on the nightstand, happy for a diversion from the troubling thoughts on the continuous loop in my head. “Hello?”

      “Hey, it’s Kenzie.”

      I smiled into the phone. “Hey, yourself.”

      “So, did you wow the boss lady last night?”

      “The dress was a hit. Thanks again for your help.”

      “Did you get the account?”

      “I’ll find out more this week, but I’m hopeful.”

      “You’ll have to call me in Jar Hollow to let me know how it goes.”

      “You’re not coming back to the city this week?”

      “No, that’s another reason I called—Oh, wait, Sam just walked in and I need to, um…give him a message. Can I call you back?”

      “Sure,” I said, then hung up with a smirk. A message—right. Good grief, the two of them were like teenagers. But I wasn’t jealous…really I wasn’t.

      I tried not to imagine the acrobatics going on in Jar Hollow while I stared at Redford’s picture and waited for Kenzie to call me back. The phone rang again less than two minutes later—of course, if the stories were true, she and Sam had had time for a quickie. I picked up the phone and sighed dramatically. “Please stop dangling your sex in front of me.”

      Dead silence sounded on the line.

      My chest blipped with panic. “Hello?”

      A deep, rumbling laugh rolled out. “Well, that’s what I call picking up where we left off.”

      I swallowed. “Who…who is this?” But I would have recognized that orgasmic voice anywhere.

      5

      LAUGHTER BOOMED over the phone again. “It’s Redford, Denise—your ex-husband. Who did you think it was?”

      I was instantly nervous, hearing his voice when my body still vibrated from his memory-induced orgasm. “Um…someone else.”

      “Sounds like a pretty interesting conversation,” he said, his smooth Southern voice infused with amusement. “If this is a bad time, I can call back.”

      “No,” I blurted, my cheeks flaming. “I can talk now.”

      “Good,” he said easily. “Listen, I got a letter from the IRS yesterday—looks like the government wants a little more of my time.”

      “I received the same letter,” I said, regaining a modicum of composure. “You’re out of the Marines?”

      “Retired for almost six months now.”

      “Where do you live?”

      “In Kentucky. Versailles, to be exact. This is where the girls are.”

      So he had children—the girls he’d wanted. I don’t know why the news surprised me, but my disappointment was acute. And then I realized that Redford having a family certainly made things easier for me—I could shake my stubborn fantasies once and for all.

      “That’s nice,” I managed.

      “And you’re still living in the same place?”

      In other words, my life hadn’t changed a bit. My chin went up. “I’ll be buying my apartment soon.”

      “Great. So, do you live alone?”

      I frowned. “Yes.”

      “No kidding? I thought you’d be remarried by now.”

      “Um, no, I’m not married.” I stared at my closet door—plastic covering the wedding gown stuck out from under the door, mocking me.

      “Not married? Don’t tell me I ruined you for other men,” he teased.

      Had he always been so cocky? My mouth tightened. “Not at all.”

      “Darn. And here I was hoping that you still carried my picture around.”

      I glanced down at the framed picture still in my hand and dropped it back into the cigar box as if it were on fire. “Sorry to disappoint.”

      He cleared his throat, as if he realized he’d over-stepped his bounds. “Well, Denise, what do you know about this audit?”

      “No more than what the letter said.”

      “Three years seems like a long time to have lapsed to be audited.” He sounded concerned.

      “No,” I assured him. “Considering the backlog at the IRS, I’d say three years is about right.”

      “Are you still a financial planner?”

      “Yes. I work for a brokerage firm now.”

      “Congratulations. Does that give us an advantage? I mean, do you deal with the IRS often?”

      “Only as an advisor to my clients regarding payment of fees or penalties.”

      At the sudden silence on the other end, I realized my response wasn’t exactly comforting, and since the audit was most likely a result of my creative accounting, I felt as if I owed him a little reassurance.

      “Redford, chances are this will be a routine interview. They’ll probably just want to ask us a few questions, see a few receipts, that sort of thing.”

      He gave a little laugh. “I don’t even know where my tax records are—in storage somewhere.”

      “I kept everything,” I said.

      “Everything?” he asked, his voice suspiciously nostalgic.

      I glanced at the cigar box containing souvenirs of my time with Redford and closed the lid. “All the tax records,” I corrected. “I’ll bring them to the interview.”

      “Great. I guess I’d better start making travel plans.”

      “The interview is a week from Tuesday,” I offered.

      “Yeah, but I’m interested in buying a stud horse in upstate New York. I was thinking I could come up early and maybe kill two birds with one stone.”

      So Redford had entered the family business. Another area where we were opposites—the closest I’d ever gotten to a horse was walking next to a carriage in Central Park, and one of the beasts had nipped a hole in my favorite sweater.

      “And I’ve never been to New York City,” he continued, “so I thought I’d try to squeeze in some sightseeing since I might never get the chance again. How would you feel about being a tour guide?”

      “Fine,” I said, then wet my lips. “Are you coming alone?”

      “Yes.”

      My shoulders dropped an inch in relief. I don’t know why, but I didn’t