One Day at a Time Read Free Page B

months. “I'm not house-sitting for you for five months,” Coco said, sounding stubborn. And films ran longer sometimes. It could be six or seven in the end.
    “Fine. I'll find someone else,” Jane said, sounding disapproving, as though Coco were a naughty child. That always got to her, no matter how often she reminded herself that she was grown up. “But I can't do that in an hour before I leave. I'll take care of it from New York. For God's sake, you'd think I was asking you to stay in the Tenderloin in a crack house. You could do a lot worse than stay here for five or six months. It might do you good, and you wouldn't have to commute.” Jane was selling hard, but Coco didn't want to buy. She hated her sister's house—it was beautiful, impeccable, and cold. It had been photographed for every decorating magazine, and Coco always felt uncomfortable there. There was no place to curl up, to feel cozy at night. And it was so immaculate, Coco was always afraid to breathe, or even eat. She wasn't the housekeeper her sister was, or even Liz. They were neat freaks in the extreme. Coco liked a friendly mess, and didn't mind a reasonable amount of disorder in her life. It drove Jane wild.
    “I'll cover it for a few days, at most a week. But you have to line up someone else. I don't want to live at your house for months,” Coco said adamantly, trying to set boundaries with her.
    “I get it. I'll do what I can. Just cover me for right now, please. How fast can you pick up the keys? And I want to show you the alarm system again, we've added some new features and they're complicated. I don't want you setting off the alarm. You can pick Jack's meals up at Canine Cuisine, they prepare them for him twice a week, Mondays and Thursdays. And don't forget, we've switched vets to Dr. Hajimoto on Sacramento Street. Jack's due for a booster shot next week.”
    “It's a good thing you don't have kids,” Coco commented drily as she turned the van around. She was going to be late, but she might as well get it over with. Her sister would drive her insane if she didn't. “You'd never be able to leave town.” Their bull mastiff had become a child substitute for them, and lived better than most people, with specially prepared meals, a trainer, a groomer who came to the house to bathe him, and more attention than many parents gave to their kids.
    Coco drove up to her sister's house, and there was already a town car waiting outside to take Jane to the airport. Coco turned off the ignition and hopped out, leaving Sallie in the car, watching out the window with interest. She was going to have a good time with Jack for the next several days. The bull mastiff was three times her size, and they'd probably break everything in the house as they chased each other around. Maybe she'd let them use her sister's pool. The only thing Coco loved about the house was the enormous projection screen in the bedroom, where she could watch movies. The bedroom was huge and the screen covered one entire wall.
    Coco rang the doorbell, and Jane yanked open the door with a cell phone pressed to her ear. She was giving someone hell about the unions, and hung up as she stared at Coco. The two women looked surprisingly alike. They both had tall, spare frames and beautiful faces. Both had modeled in their teens. The most noticeable difference between them was that Jane was all sharp edges, with long straight blond hair pulled back in a ponytail. Coco's long, loose auburn hair and slightly gentler curves made her look warmer, and there was a smile in her eyes. Everything about Jane screamed stress. There had always been a sharp edge to her, even as a kid, but those that knew her intimately, knew that despite the razor tongue, she was a decent person and had a good heart. But there was no denying she was tough. Coco knew it well.
    She was wearing black jeans, a black T-shirt, and a black leather jacket, and diamond studs in her ears. Coco was wearing a white T-shirt, jeans