The Winners Circle Read online

  “Are you sure it’s for Friday’s drawing?” He’d stashed several tickets in his wallet over the last month. He waited for disappointment to assume her demeanor.

  “I’ve checked this thing at least one hundred times.”

  “Oh, yeah?”

  “I called the phone number a dozen times. It’s ours. All ours.”

  “Are you sure?” He let her run with it. Perhaps it was thousands and not millions. A few thousand seemed like millions to them.

  “Didn’t you hear me?” She started to whisper. “No one even knows it’s us yet.”

  He recognized her resolve. His wife was thorough if anything. “Just us?” he asked, edging into belief.

  “Yes.” She returned the ticket to her pocket.

  “How much?”

  “Thirty-two million,” she whispered even lower. Her eyes shifted side to side, as if she and Jerry were under surveillance and secret tax agents might fly from the curtains.

  Jerry let the big number bounce inside his head. His brain refused to process it. The heart monitor changed its tune. “Thirty-two?”

  “It’s more than half of sixty, because you selected the instant payment plan.”

  He didn’t remember doing that. It was something that just happened because he didn’t specify. Like the numbers themselves, he took what Mojique at the Seven-Eleven gave him for a dollar. “It’s our money?”

  “Get it through your thick skull, Jerry Nearing. You almost died a millionaire.”

  A warm sense of relief washed over him, like when he sunk in a steaming tub after a hard day of shoveling manure. No more arguing over which bills to pay first. Forget the menial jobs. He held still. A mixed cocktail of chemicals passed through his bloodstream. He floated above the mattress, sailing into another dimension.

  “I guess I can fix the roof,” he finally said.

  “Fix the roof?” Chelsea reached up to draw her hair into a ponytail. She fidgeted her hand behind her head. Her blue eyes stared off. She wasn’t herself, as if a rattlesnake had bitten her too. “We can hire someone to fix the roof. On second thought, let’s sell the dump.”

  “I thought you wanted the farm?”

  “I’ve changed my mind.”

  “I know it needs work, but it’s our dream house.”

  She patted her uniform pocket. “That was before this.”

  He realized she wasn’t kidding. He waited for a better explanation, but a nurse stood in the doorway, watching them both, and their dialogue stopped cold.

  The attending nurse—shapely with deep-set eyes—stepped forward. She wore bright pink sneakers, which squeaked on the floor. Her nametag read Gina Spagnoli. “I see you’re awake.”

  “He’s clear and cognizant,” Chelsea said.

  “I can’t sleep forever,” Jerry added.

  “I’d stay away from snakes,” Nurse Gina said. “Or that might happen for real.”

  “If this place doesn’t kill me first.”

  “Don’t blame us for stepping in a rattlesnake pit.” Gina’s humor was welcome, the attractive adornment of a young woman without worry. It offset Chelsea’s intensity, the missing ingredient in the room.

  Jerry relaxed. His arms went limp. The heart monitor assumed another rhythm.

  Gina checked his blood pressure. Her hands were cool on Jerry’s itchy skin, tiny points of relief. She kept glancing at Chelsea. “Where do you work?”

  “Physical therapy.”

  “Here?”

  “No, Mercer.”

  “Oh.” Gina turned away, discounting Chelsea as some people did. It didn’t matter that they were both medical professionals. Gina worked in Princeton and probably lived there too. She believed she was better.

  At least, Chelsea thought so. She scratched her nose, hooking a finger over her mouth. Jerry recognized her rising insecurity.

  “I’ll get the doctor.” Gina scribbled on his chart. She winked at Jerry before leaving the room.

  He felt sleepy. He’d lost his train of thought. He asked Chelsea to draw the curtains and dim the light.

  The room smelled sterile and dry. He focused on the farmhouse. There was plenty of room along the south side to attach a baby nursery. They’d bought the place because of the acreage, and the way property values had expanded, they probably couldn’t afford to buy it again. “Good deal,” he said. He’d finally struck dumb luck. He might tear the house down and start from scratch.

  Chelsea buzzed about the room, arranging the chairs, straightening her clothes in the mirror. He watched her through the slits in his eyes. The woman was never at peace. Perhaps the influx of cash would buy her satisfaction in places she never thought possible.

  “Chel?”

  She didn’t hear him, her lips moving, locked in thought.

  “Chel?” he said louder. “What’s the matter?”

  She flopped in the vinyl chair and crossed her legs. “I don’t know what to do with myself.”

  “I can see that.” He blamed himself. For a year, he’d worn her to a frazzle—a thread of hope that he doubted still existed. They’d been falling into an endless hole of debt and anxiety. Who knew there was a pile of cash at the bottom?

  “I’ve been pent-up here all weekend,” she said.

  “Why don’t you go home and take a shower?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Pull yourself together for work tomorrow.”

  “I’m not going in.”

  “Taking a day off?”

  “I quit.”

  “But you love that job.”

  “I love vacations too. When’s the last time we had one of those?”

  His eyes were fully open. He wasn’t resting with her like this. He needed to watch her. She might skyrocket to the moon if he didn’t maintain his sightlines.

  “I just had an idea,” she said.

  He braced himself. It wasn’t like her to make spur of the moment decisions. She blueprinted everything, organized the linen closet like a computer schematic, mapped out shopping trips like military assaults. He saw her on her feet again, pacing. He had the feeling that he’d been asleep for much longer than a single weekend.

  “I was thinking,” she said.

  “I was too. We can start that family, and ...”

  She flashed her teeth and gums. “How about a real vacation? I want to see Europe. I want to see Paris in the spring.”

  CHAPTER 3

  The King of Hopewell

  The secret was out. People knew about the money. The knowledge lay bare like Chelsea’s harelip. Jerry saw it in their eyes. Nurses, orderlies, educated doctors stared at the lucky couple, expecting dollar bills to seep from their pores. Jerry wondered if he shouldn’t just start tipping the staff, but he knew Chelsea despised overt public displays. She curled her finger in front of her mouth, like he hadn’t seen since high school.

  Nurse Gina Spagnoli pushed Jerry’s wheelchair toward the lobby of Princeton Memorial. He ignored the people who paused to check him out. Thank God, the hospital banned the press and television cameras. He looked forward to Chelsea and him being shut away on their broken-down farm, with the big black dog and dozens of Osage trees buffering them from the world.

  “Where’s your wife?” Gina’s pink sneakers squeaked on the lobby floor.

  “Bringing the truck around front.”

  “Have you known her long?”

  “Yes.” Jerry glanced over his shoulder. Gina wore makeup and a gold necklace with blood red stones. She’d taken to visiting his room whenever Chelsea went home. She talked about her skiing trips and her real estate job on the side. He preferred listening to her big time plans, rather than her suggestions of his.

  Gina behaved as if her every word needed to find ears. “I think people should have a lot of experiences.”

  “Chelsea and I grew up together.”

  “There’s been no one else?”

  “Just her.”

  Gina pushed Jerry into the elevator, and they descended the building. He s
melled her rosy perfume. Chelsea never wore scents. She jogged several miles a day and was built better than most women, but she loathed the attention wrought from perfume and fancy clothes.

  When the doors retracted, the light was dim. Pipes and electric conduit ran along the ceiling. Jerry squinted. It was like a completely different building. “Where are we?”

  “The basement.”

  “Is this the way out?”

  “I saw the others staring at you.”

  “I don’t mind,” he said, relieved she had the foresight.

  “We can take the elevator closest to the front door.”

  He felt lame. He was strong enough to walk. He wanted to use the steps and sneak out the back door. “You don’t have to do this.”

  “Relax.” Gina stopped pushing. She placed her hands on his shoulders and worked her thumbs into his skin.

  “What’s this?”

  “What do you think? You’re so tense.”

  He noticed the kinks in his muscles. Her fingers detailed every knot. He let her hands work their magic, sensing his troubles melt away. Since the moment he’d awoken from the snakebite, he’d been in a haze, as if his body didn’t belong to him, as if his thoughts came from someone else. “This is good.”

  “You have enough to deal with. You shouldn’t do this to yourself.”

  Her fingers crawled along the base of his neck. Goosebumps rose on his arms. Chelsea was a physical therapist. She was able to do this, but he hesitated to ask.

  Gina kneaded the long muscles over his shoulder blades, as if folding and flattening dough. “Good boy.”

  He felt weird about the basement massage. She was ten years younger, yet handling him like a child.

  “Good boy.” She returned to his neck, fingering his spine. “It’s really been only Chelsea?”

  “Yes.” His skin felt warm, no more rash yet hot in a good way.

  “Don’t you regret it?”

  “Regret what?” He wondered if they were really talking about him? Their conversations were always about her.

  Gina slid over the arm of the chair and onto his lap. Her nose parked inches from his own. She acted natural, continuing her massage, but her uniform blouse was unbuttoned, offering a glimpse of her full chest. Jerry blushed, his face and ears bright with blood. He knew they were crimson red.

  “Don’t you want to sample more of the world?” she asked.

  “Like what?”

  “I bet there’s a lot you haven’t seen.”

  He shifted his legs, hiding his erection. He was ashamed to be aroused so suddenly. He never generated this affect on women. He wasn’t supposed to be desirable. He was married.

  “I can be a blonde,” she said. “Is that what you like?”

  His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth, unable to form reasonable words. He tried not to breathe. Her warm breath bathed his face.

  “I’m younger than her,” she said. “Think of me in ten years. I know how to take care of myself.”

  She slid his hand inside her shirt, forcing it against her chest. Her bra was unsnapped in the front. “I can be better in other ways. Someone in your position ... deserves the best.”

  He posed like a department store mannequin, staring into her eyes. Her supple breast filled his palm, like a spanking-new car headrest just out of the bag.

  She rubbed his chest. “Think of all the things we can do.”

  “I don’t know.” His mind gridlocked over the possibilities. Over recent weeks, he’d read about exotic travel, fancy cars, and houses with more staff than family members. Rich men were expected to consume the world and all the women in it. Kings and Presidents swore by it, but he’d loved Chelsea since fifth grade, when they’d stumbled into a beehive and ran screaming across the corn rows of Chesterfield. His love for her was deep enough to swim in. It felt silly to think that way, yet as he watched his friends’ marriages dissolve, some more than once, he believed that they never experienced real love. With Chelsea, he’d already won the grand prize.

  “I can change the world for you.” She kissed him, drawing his bottom lip between her own. “See, my mouth is flawless.”

  He dropped his lingering hand. He wanted to demean her, erase his pitiful moment of weakness. “What more of the world is there?”

  “A whole lot.” Gina’s eyebrows arched upward, undeterred. She jammed her business card into his shirt pocket and hopped off his lap. She winked like the first time she’d laid eyes on him. “See you around.”

  She began pushing the wheelchair again.

  He shivered once, a tremor from his soul. He hoped she hadn’t seen it. He didn’t want to her to think she understood him.

  Chelsea took the wheel of the old Ford. She drove the back roads to Hopewell, with the pickup sputtering and stalling around the corners. “I hate this truck.”

  Jerry barely listened. He was shedding the guilt of being with Gina Spagnoli. He sensed the square edges of her business card in his chest pocket. He formed excuses, blaming the ambitious nurse for the encounter. He determined to never tell Chelsea. “What did you say?”

  “I can’t wait to drive this rusted piece of junk into the river. Why don’t we do it this afternoon?”

  “We’re always going to need a knock-around car.”

  “We’ll buy another knock-around, a brand new one.”

  “Why waste the money?”

  “Oh Jerry, don’t be so pedestrian.”

  The Ford’s engine coughed and chopped down the road. Jerry bucked on the tattered bench seat. “Ease off the gas.”

  “It needs more gas.” She pressed the pedal, and the engine died.

  They coasted along a bucolic section of Elm Road. Jerry listened to the tires on the asphalt and the wind swooshing through the window vents.

  The truck rolled to a halt beside a drainage trench. The brakes squeaked like Gina’s shoes.

  “Hit the flashers,” Jerry said. “We’re half in the road.”

  He left the cab and popped the hood. His arms and legs felt sore; his back too. After more than a week of lying around, he wasn’t at full power, yet if he fixed the truck and got them back on the road, his troubles seemed small. It felt good to be working.

  The smell of hot engine grime stoked his vigor. He waited for the backfire smoke to clear. He plunged a screwdriver into the carburetor and flipped it open.

  The sun baked his head and the back of his neck. He glanced at the windshield to view Chelsea’s scowl. He might stand outside all afternoon to avoid another argument.

  But they weren’t alone. A beige sedan pulled up behind the pickup. Jerry watched two men rise from the front seat. One gripped a camera in his hands.

  “Hit the ignition.”

  Chelsea stuck her head out the window. “What?”

  “Turn it over.”

  The engine moaned and gurgled. Jerry slammed down the hood and shuffled to Chelsea’s window. “Slide over.”

  “You want to drive?”

  “There’re two reporters behind us.” He swung open the door and jumped in. He felt his pulse hitting the mainstream. One of the men raised his camera and snapped a photo.

  “Reporters?” Chelsea’s voice shrunk.

  “That’s my guess. They must’ve followed us from the hospital.”

  She ducked below the seat. “I don’t want my picture in the paper.”

  Jerry pulled onto the road, spewing black smoke in the men’s faces. He watched them in the side mirror. They raced for their car.

  “What are you doing?” Chelsea’s head was in his lap.

  “I’m going to outrun them.”

  “You’re barely going twenty miles per hour.”

  “It’s all the truck’ll give me.” He checked the mirror. The sedan crawled behind them, caught in a dark cloud. One photographer leaned through the window, but the smoke was too much to bear.

  “Here they come.” Jerry started to swerve to keep them from passing.

  “Stop it.” Chelsea rolled
onto the floor, smacking her head on the dashboard. “This will never work.”

  “I won’t let them at you.”

  “You’ll have to stop sometime.”

  He jockeyed the truck. He hadn’t thought that far ahead. He focused on their Pleasant Valley home. The reporters might tail them to their front door. “I’m going to lose them.”

  “Jerry, they’re professionals.”

  He pulled aside to give a pack of cyclists the right of way. A dozen people in helmets and stretchy pants peddled past the Ford, gagging on the fumes.

  A man on a dayglo orange bike turned his head toward Jerry. “Get off the road!”

  “Is that them?” Chelsea raised her fist above the dashboard. “Paparazzi!”

  Jerry floored the gas pedal. The Ford bucked and sputtered, maintaining minimum speed. He fishtailed onto Jacob Johansen’s farm.

  The tires skipped over the potholes and rocks on the dirt driveway. He noticed the sedan bobbing and weaving behind. The men hopped in the seat, flailing from side to side.

  Jerry raced for the house. A thin gray trail spiraled up from the smokehouse. The air smelled like bacon and spent transmission fluid. “We’ve got them now.”

  “Got what?” Chelsea braced herself between the dashboard and the floor. She scrunched her face, like a beaver retreating into a hole.

  “I can lose them at the creek.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Hold on.” Jerry wheeled around the barn.

  Jacob blocked the middle of the path. The old man stood beside the big plow horse, gripping the bridle reins. His mouth dropped open as if to take in the wind of the approaching vehicle.

  The truck was a bullet in slow motion. It bore down on Jacob and the huge horse, wrapped in a shroud of dust and burning oil.

  “Shit.” He cut the wheel and crashed into the chicken coop, knocking the hen house off its legs. Chickens balked and scattered into the air. Two Rhode Island Reds smacked the windshield and disappeared in a flurry of flapping wings and shooting feathers.

  “Oh God,” Chelsea wailed, “this is just like Princess Di.”

  Jerry stayed on the pedal, punching through the coop on the opposite side. Chicken wire folded and scraped over the cab of the truck. He heard Chelsea screaming.