Read Online Antonia's Choice by Nancy Rue - Free Book Online

had to have expensive cameras—” I grunted. “Actually, he had to have expensive everything. They have a wine cellar—there must be five hundred bottles of wine in there, and we’re not talking the kind with the twist-off cap.”
    â€œMercy.”
    â€œHe had a sailboat—maybe he still does—a forty-foot thing he’d take to the islands with his buddies. And the vacations he and Bobbi and the kids took—I mean, who carts their children off to Club Med?”
    â€œHe does, I take it.”
    I nodded. “But I don’t know, Reg. I always knew he was a jerk. I never wanted her to marry the slime bucket in the first place, but, I mean, could he possibly have sunk this low? Listen to this.”
    Reggie put a lid on the chicken and joined me at the snack bar.
    â€œThe Orchid Club,” I said, referring to the screen. “That was sixteen guys who were into ‘Lollies’—that’s what they call the little girls they look at, short for Lolita.”
    â€œOh, that is just tragic.”
    â€œThey lived in all these different countries, but each of them had a video camera attached to their screens which enabled them together to watch a ten-year-old girl being—”
    â€œStop.” Reggie sank onto the stool beside me. “Honey, you sure you want to read more? How much do you need to know?”
    â€œI don’t know.” I backed out of the website and closed the cover to the laptop. “I don’t know what I need. I just keep wondering how my sister could have this going on in her house and not know about it. She cleans the entire place every single day. You hardly ever see her without the vacuum cleaner and a can of Pledge.”
    â€œYeah, but if he’s the ogre you say he is, couldn’t he just make that room off-limits?”
    I considered that as I nibbled on my thumbnail. “I guess so. That has to be it. Bobbi is a milquetoast, but I have to believe she’d draw the line at this if she knew. You have never seen a total mother like her. Those kids are always dressed to the nines. She throws birthday parties with
themes.
She was appalled when I had Ben’s last party at McDonald’s.” I tried to grin at Reggie. “She would definitely have Children’s Tylenol on hand.”
    â€œYeah, but honey, you aren’t the mother who’s in jail, now, are you?” Reggie got up to turn the chicken.
    â€œYou should see the scrapbooks she has for the kids,” I went on. I wasn’t normally a babbler, but I felt compelled to keep talking until something made sense. “Wyndham must have five or six of them just of her by now—all done with die cuts and theme pages.”
    â€œShe’s into themes.”
    â€œThe pictures are exquisite. They never took their kids to Olan Mills, because Sid’s photographs are so good.”
    Reggie turned from the stove as my eyes sought to meet hers.
    â€œSome of the most beautiful pictures I have of Ben as a baby were taken by Sid,” I said.
    â€œAnd look what that pervert has turned his gift into,” Reggie said. “Honey, don’t you know he’s going to burn in hell.”
    The thoughts I was spilling out suddenly stopped, as if they’d run into something they didn’t want to see, much less express.
    â€œYou know what, Reg?” I said suddenly. “I don’t really feel like eating.”
    Ben got restless after Reggie left, so I suggested I give him a bath, à la Nurse Nightmares advice. He didn’t have the energy to pitch a fit, but he shook his head so violently I gave up on the idea. I got more juice into him and another Tylenol. When he drifted off to sleep again, I put him in my bed and crawled in beside him in my pajamas, laptop on my knees. Despite Reggie’s wariness, I needed to know more.
    The money angle wasn’t too difficult to read about. It felt good to get my blood boiling when I