Page 5 of Tex's Angel

I quickly apologize, “Sorry I called your son a delinquent. I didn’t mean it.” Rubbing my free hand over my face, I say, “It’s just hard getting woken up all the time.”

My neighbor huffs out an exasperated breath and grumbles, “For me and everybody else in this damn neighborhood as well.” Closing his mouth, he studies me for a few seconds before adding, “I’d put my money on that two-timing husband of yours. Does he have a second key fob perchance?”

My mouth drops open. How does he even know my business? Ah yes. Everyone on the damn street saw my naked sister. “Ex-husband,” I say indignantly. “Well. Almost ex. I never even thought of that. I was under the impression only one key fob came with my vehicle.”

“You usually get two,” he says before turning to go back inside his house.

“Sorry, again,” I call out right before he steps into his house and slams the door. He didn’t even tell me, ‘you’re welcome’, maybe they didn’t teach good manners in Texas?

I march back into my house, set the house alarm, and go straight for my cell phone. Plucking my soon-to-be ex-husband’s number from my contact list, I call him, fucked if I care that it’s two in the morning. He answers groggily on the fifth ring.

“Hello. Who is this?”

“Wake up, Chris. We need to talk,” I snap at him.

I hear my sister ask, “Who is it.”

Chris whispers, “Shut the hell up, Gina. It’s Clara.”

“Give me the phone,” my sister says excitedly.

“After I talk,” he whispers back. “Hold on, Clara. I’m going into my home office.”

I’m disappointed. Clearly this wasn’t Chris’ doing if I had to wake him to ask. I decide to see if he has an extra key fob anyway, since I have him on the line.

His voice becomes warm and sweet. “Alright, sweetheart. I’m glad you finally decided to call me back. Better late than never.”

“Look Chris, someone has been setting off my car alarm in the middle of the night. It’s driving me nuts.”

“What? When did this start?” His concerned tone might have impressed me if I wasn’t already one hundred percent sure he was a lying, cheating, snake.

“A couple of weeks ago. It just happened again. The thing is, no one is there when I go out and check.”

“You need me, sweetheart. Just call off this whole divorce and let me come home. I’ll take care of whoever’s doing this to you, and we can pretend like nothing ever happened with your sister.”

I actually have to hold back a laugh, because that would never happen in a million years. “When we bought the car, was there a second key fob?”

“Yes. I put it in the safe with our other important stuff.”

My head snaps up to look at the picture covering the wall safe.

“I’m sure you don’t remember the combination, but I could open it for you,” he suggests helpfully.

“No thanks. I remember it.”

I start to take the phone from my ear, but he hastily asks, “So, is it okay for me to come home? Look, I don’t even care that you can’t get pregnant anymore. I still want you. Are we good?”

“Of course we aren’t fucking good,” I tell him tersely. “You have a new girlfriend now. Remember, she’s waiting for you in bed?”

“Now Clara, don’t be that way. You know I didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

I walk over to the safe. Before I disconnect the call, I tell him, “Three months and our divorce will be final. I’m counting down the days. Hope you are too.”

After ending the call, I toss my phone onto the bed and open the safe. He used my birthday as the combination. How he thought I could forget my own birthday is beyond my ability to reason. When I pull the door to the safe open, I see the extra key fob, laying right there on top of my birth certificate and deeds to the house. I pull it out and look it over, sorely tempted to use it to turn on my car alarm just to annoy my neighbor. I don’t though because I’d have to annoy everyone else as well. I replace the fob and shut the safe before heading back to bed in the hope of getting a few more hours of sleep before I have to get up for work.

Chapter 4

Tex

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