Femme Fatale and other stories by Laura Lippman Page B

would sound like one of those celebrity impersonator services. Besides, it wasn’t elegant. She wanted to take a word or reference that had no meaning in the culture and make it come to mean good, no-strings, quid pro quo sex. Like … “zephyr.” Only not “zephyr,” because it denoted quickness, and she wanted to market sex as a spa service for men, a day or night of pampering with a long list of services and options. So not “zephyr,” but a word like it, one that sounded cool and elegant but whose real meaning was virtually unknown and therefore malleable in the public imagination. Amazon.com was another good example. Or eBay. Familiar yet new.
    But that fantasy seemed more out of reach than ever. Now she would settle for keeping the life she already had.
    â€œSeriously, Heloise. What’s up?”
    â€œI missed you,” she said lamely, yet not inaccurately. She missed Brad’s adoration, which never seemed to dim. For a long time she had expected him to marry someone else, to pursue the average family he claimed he wanted to have with her. But now that they were both pushing forty with a very short stick, she was beginning to think that Brad liked things just the way they were. As long as he carried a torch for a woman he could never have, he didn’t have to marry or have kids. Back when Scott was born, Brad had dared to believe he was the father, had even hopefully volunteered to take a DNA test. She had to break it to him very gently that he wasn’t, and that she didn’t want him to be part of Scott’s life under any circumstances, even as an uncle or Mommy’s “friend.” She couldn’t afford for Scott to have any contact with her old life, no matter how remote or innocuous.
    â€œEveryone okay? You, Scott? Melina?” Melina was her nanny, the single most important person in her employ. The girls could come and go, but Heloise could never make things work without Melina.
    â€œWe’re all fine.”
    â€œSo what’s this meeting about?”
    â€œLike I said, I missed you.” She sounded more persuasive this time.
    â€œWeezie, Weezie, Weezie,” he said, using the pet name that only he was allowed. “Why didn’t things work out between us?”
    â€œI always felt it was because I wanted to continue working after marriage.”
    â€œWell, yeah, but … it’s not like I was opposed to you working on principle. It was just—a cop can’t be married to a prostitute, Weezie.”
    â€œIt’s my career,” she said. It was her career and her excuse. No matter what she had chosen as her vocation, Brad would never have been the right man for her. He had taken care of her on the streets, asking nothing in return, and she had taken him to bed a time or two, grateful for all he did. But it had never been a big passion for her. It had, in fact, been more like a free sample, the kind of thing a corporation does to build up community goodwill. A free sample to someone she genuinely liked, but a freebie nonetheless, like one of those little boxes of detergent left in the mailbox. You might wash your clothes in it, but it probably didn’t change your preferences in the long run.
    They held hands, staring out at Eastern Avenue. They had been sweeping this area lately, Brad said, and the trade had dried up. But they both knew that was only temporary. Eventually the girls and the boys came back, and the men were never far behind. They all came back, springing up like mushrooms after a rain.
    H ER MEETING WITH S COTT ’ S DAD , in the visiting room at Supermax, was even briefer than her coffee date with Brad. Scott’s father was not particularly surprised to see her; she had made a point of coming every few months or so, to keep up the charade that she had nothing to do with him being here. His red hair seemed duller after so many years inside, but maybe it was just the contrast with the