“Don’t you touch me!” Susie shrieked back.

“Susie, get gone,” Joe warned.

“Fuck you, Joe Callahan!” Susie snapped.

“You wish!” Josie yelled. “Everyone knows you tried to get in there and nothin’ goin’. Now everyone knows you and Tina are talkin’ trash about Cal and Violet because you made your play and he didn’t like what he got when he had his piece of you so he threw it away and Tina’s been livin’ by him yonks and couldn’t catch his eye.” She looked at me. “Can’t deny, we’re all real curious, the whole town is, but it don’t take a psychiatrist to see you’re hot, Cal’s hot, hot attracts hot so, you know, hot moves in next door, shit’s gonna happen.”

I’d stopped struggling because I was staring at Josie and now trying not to giggle as I got the rest of why everyone kept staring at Joe, me and the girls and I found it didn’t annoy me anymore. It would hit me much later that Susie Shepherd was one of Joe’s ex-lovers but when it did, it didn’t hit me hard. She was gorgeous for one so that explained that. She was a bitch for another and that explained why Joe took what he wanted and then didn’t come back for more. Therefore it wasn’t worth discussion, something which I decided Joe and I would never have and we never did.

“Um…” I started, “you know me but I don’t…”

“Josie Judd,” she said, coming forward seemingly impervious to the rain, hand extended, “Chip’s my husband.” I shook her hand and shoved wet hair out of my face while blinking against the fat drops of rain hitting my eyes as she stepped back and kept talking. “Sorry Chip f**ked up your wiring. He tried real hard to figure that shit out, spent all night goin’ over Cal’s plans but Cal’s a security genius. My Chip, he’s good but he isn’t a genius or I’d be livin’ in LA gettin’ a pedicure every week.”

“Oh, please, this is gonna make me sick,” Susie griped and Josie whirled on her.

“Then go away and by the way,” Josie said, “Chip likes my pu**y but it’s my mouth he loves and that’s because I love his big, gorgeous dick. You stop bein’ such a bitch, Susie, and use your mouth for good not bad, you might get a man with a beautiful dick who’ll give you some on a regular basis instead of runnin’ as fast as they can to get away from you. Only man you could hold onto was Colt and he was only f**kin’ you ‘cause you reminded him of Feb.”

“Oh Jesus,” Chip mumbled.

I was thinking this was a lot of information most of which I didn’t want to know but I really didn’t want my daughters to know it.

I twisted my neck slightly and whispered over the wind to Joe, “Please tell me my daughters are no longer here.”

“Gone, buddy,” Joe muttered and he didn’t sound pissed, he sounded like he wanted to laugh.

“Bea?” I asked.

“Gone,” Joe answered.

“Thank God,” I murmured.

“He likes your trashy mouth,” Susie shot back, my eyes turned to see she looked fit to be tied but she was also not stupid enough to go so far as to make it get physical again. She’d learned that lesson twice in the last five minutes. Now she was just trying to save face.

“Only one’s got a trashy mouth is you, Susie Shepherd,” Josie retorted and put a hand to her hitched hip and threw out a foot and I tensed because this stance boded bad tidings in Catfight Land. Josie didn’t seem at all fazed by the fact that it was pouring buckets and the wind was whipping her hair and dress all around, she was in the zone. “I don’t know what you said to Violet to make her take you down like that but I do know you better watch your ass. You got enemies and we’re not talkin’ enemies like Denny Lowe. We’re talkin’ women who are up to here,” she lifted a straightened out hand to her chin and continued, “with your and Tina’s shit and we ain’t takin’ it anymore.”

She’d mentioned Dennis Lowe, the serial killer that made Feb and Colt’s life a living hell and that was when I knew who Susie Shepherd was. I’d read about her in the articles about that whole mess. At the end, Dennis Lowe had held her hostage and shot her.

This shocked me. Something like that happened to me, I would likely not be wandering strip malls, randomly picking fights with my ex-lover’s girlfriends. Hell, I’d never do that.

That was just me though. Maybe she was experiencing post-traumatic stress or something.

“Josie –” I started.

“You the one toilet papered Tina’s yard?” Susie, eyes to Josie, asked over me.

“Nope but I’ll give you ten guesses as to who did it and I’ll bet you still won’t figure it out ‘cause there’s probably a hundred women in this town who’d do it,” Josie answered. “Both of you tryin’ to cozy up to our men, talkin’ shit about what we do and wear, makin’ trouble,” Josie said. “You know, Susie, anyone shot me because I was a bitch, I’d learn my lesson. Maybe you should take some of your Daddy’s money, go somewhere quiet and reflect. For, I don’t know, say,” she paused then finished, “a hundred years?”

Susie paled and whispered over the wind, “I can’t believe you’d say that to me.”

“And I can’t believe you’d get in Violet’s face when her brother was murdered three weeks ago!” Josie snapped. “Let me set things straight for you, Susie. Your Daddy’s money didn’t give you carte blanche to traipse around town bein’ like you are and you can’t trade on the tragedy of what happened with Denny Lowe to be like you are. We all know you sold Colt and Feb’s story to that reporter. We didn’t think much of you before, now we don’t think anything at all.”

“Josie –” Chip started, Josie jerked her head to look at her husband and lifted a hand.

“I’m done,” she stated, turned to me, switched topics and turned off her attitude so quickly I wasn’t keeping up. “You two come over for dinner. Maybe I’ll get Colt and Feb to come over too. I’ll make my pot roast. That’s a winter dish but my pot roast kicks ass. I’ll call,” she offered this invitation again like she wasn’t standing in the pouring rain and like she hadn’t just laid it out for Susie Shepherd in an extremely brutal way.

She came up to me and gave me a cheek kiss even though Joe still had me in his arms and I didn’t resist and cheek-kissed her back mostly because I was a little scared of her. Then she moved away, smiled at Joe and trotted over to her husband while I could do nothing but stare.