Feeling positively voyeuristic studying the interaction between Leslie Carmen, her husband and two daughters out by the pool from his hidden perch inside the kitchen, Chase watched the 45 year old woman hand a glass of lemonade to the pregnant older girl then stride to the other side of the pool and deliver one of her youngest.
In between, Lyle Carmen barely acknowledged his wife's presence, only raising the empty glass he'd been drinking his scotch from when she walked by him a second time.
"What a douche bag," Chase couldn't help but think as he watched Leslie take Lyle's glass and re-fill it from the bottle sitting on the table in the shade.
Looking over to his right, Chase saw the cluttered pile of bills on the Carmen's kitchen table. Juxtaposing that reality with the affluent facade Lyle and Leslie were still trying to put forth brought a wry little grin to Chase's face. Having grown up rather poor, coming to these people's homes through his line of work always brought a level of internal amusement to the young man. Seeing the lengths these rich bastards would go through to make everyone else on the block think they were one step ahead of the race was priceless, and in the Carmen's case, it was extra rich considering several people on the street had already been kicked off the curb.
Strolling over to the pile of bills, Chase thumbed through them until he found a past due notice from Nevada Fidelity.
"HHMMM..HA," his chuckle echoed through the empty kitchen. "Guess they knew I'd show up at some point!"
Given all the professional joy he was taking from all this, Chase never lost sight that this visit was much more personal. Casually walking back to the sink to check on the progression of things outside, Chase caught Leslie stealing several quick glances towards the window, as if to see if she could detect anyone's presence inside given the angle of the Sun that time of the day.
That's about when Chase suddenly perked up. Lyle Carmen had steadied himself with his freshly filled glass of scotch before pulling himself out of his deck chair.
"Son of a Bitch is going to come inside," was Chase's first instinct when he saw the older man stagger to his feet and point his wife off to the side.
A look of confused indecision written like graffiti across Leslie's normally stern and no-nonsense face, even Chase held his breath for the next few seconds to play out. Bracing himself for possibly having to come face to face once again with Lyle Carmen, this time in the man's very own home, Chase shook his head with disbelief when he saw the older man drunkenly stumble towards the edge of the pool.
Seeing the look of exasperation and unease in Leslie's gait as she went to help her 57 year old husband, Chase had to contain his laughter when Lyle awkwardly plopped himself down on an inflatable chair and floated out to the center of the pool.
That moment of comic relief out of the way, Chase turned his attention to Leslie's two daughters. The pregnant one named Candace was sitting no more than 20 feet from the window with her back turned. It was hard to tell whether the girl was napping or intently reading the magazine pushed up to her face as she roasted there under the Sun with a nearly done bun in her oven.
The younger girl, Courtney, was the one who really struck Chase's fancy.
"She looks like a lot of trouble," he assessed correctly, meaning it as quite the compliment, even though he'd never met the girl. It was simply a radar he'd honed over the years.
Propped against the front of the sink as he peered out the window, Chase couldn't help lowering his right hand down to his crotch and massaging the ample log pressing along the inside of his trousers as he alternated his admiring gaze between Leslie and her bikini clad youngest girl.
Not wanting to shoot his wad prematurely, at some point Chase reluctantly pulled his hand away from his crotch and focused his full attention back to Leslie.
"It almost looks like she's standing out there on an island, all by herself," he couldn't help but note.
Leslie's husband, apropo of his current lot in life, was adrift in the center of the pool, drunk without a care in the world. At the very same time, her two daughters were completely absorbed in their own worlds as well, leaving Leslie in the center of her spacious backyard, vacillating over her next ultimate move.
Staring out at the married woman as she stood pensively under the withering midday Sun, as if totally disconnected from the three members of her immediate family, Chase swore he could see the same twinkle of selfish want (and base human need) flickering in Leslie's eyes that he vividly remembered from five years earlier.
It took several more anxious moments of watching Leslie's defenses melt away before Chase finally leaned back and stood at full attention seeing Leslie began her slow and lonely trek back towards the house.
Stealing one last glance at Lyle and the two girls just to make sure they were staying put, none of the three so much as looked Leslie as she bowed her head and rounded the corner of the house.
Stepping back and leaning against the far kitchen counter, Chase folded his arms and waited for Leslie to walk back in. Saying nothing, the younger man simply stared on and grinned like a coyote when Mrs. Carmen re-entered the kitchen.
Studying every subtle move the married woman made, even someone who's heart was as hardened as Chase's skipped a beat when he saw Leslie turn and twist the deadbolt to lock before looking up to face him.
The two then shared what amounted to a face to face, "OK Corral" type moment where each waited for the other to make the next move. Leslie finally did, bowing her head again as she shuffled her feet slowly across the kitchen floor.
"There's a few spots down in the basement...plenty of places to hide in case..," she offered in a whispered tone of resolute acceptance.
If anything, the corners of Chase's already smiling lips creeped even higher on his cheeks hearing the surrender in Leslie's voice. A shake of his head told her what he thought of that option.
"We can't do it in the bedroom...its on the second floor.....and...its..........," Leslie fumbled.
This time Chase simply shot down that option with a stone cold stare.