A Parfait Murder (24 page)

“Charlize Guidry? This is Cal McCormack from the Dalliance Police Department. I’m here to conduct a welfare check.”

“That’s why,” Bree said softly.

“I’m fine,” Char yelled through the door. “You can go.”

“No, ma’am. I’m afraid I can’t. We got a report of suspicious activity in your room, and I need to verify with my own eyes that you’re okay.”

“Go. Away.”

“No, ma’am.”

Cal must have gotten a passkey from the manager, because the door opened as far as the safety latch would allow. Char jumped back as if she’d been stung.

Bree, always quick on her feet, took advantage of Char’s momentary confusion to jump up and knock the gun from Char’s hand.

Char dived for the gun, but by then I was in motion. I scrambled off the chair, kicked the gun under the bed, and sat on Char, while Bree lunged for the door.

“Ow!” Cal yelled as Bree slammed the door closed so she could release the safety latch.

Bree threw open the door. “She’s got a gun,” she yelled as she stepped out of Cal’s way.

Cal pushed his way into the room, gun drawn, and froze when he saw me sitting on Char.

“Lord a’mighty, Tally,” he swore softly. “This is the second time in six months I’ve busted into a room to find you sittin’ on someone.” He sighed. “We gotta get you a new hobby.”

W
ithin twenty-four hours, everything changed.

Char—nee Shirley Mackintee—had been hauled off to jail. Sonny had been arrested for fraud, but Cal said he was already talking about a deal: immunity in exchange for his testimony against Char and a return of all the fake investment money. He’d taken the news of Char’s crimes pretty hard, but he’d taken the news that he wasn’t Alice’s daddy even harder.

Closer to home, now that Bree was off the hook, the rest of us could try to put the pieces of our lives back together.

First and foremost, that meant me figuring out whether I could stay with Finn despite the fact that he and Bree had had a fling. Despite the fact that he had a child with my cousin and best friend. Despite everything.

To give myself the space to think, I’d passed up home and the A-la-mode in favor of a red vinyl booth, a basket of onion rings, and a giant chocolate-dipped cone of soft serve. I’m not sure how Wayne found me at the Tasty-Swirl, but he did. I guess after seventeen years of marriage, we knew each other pretty well.

“Mind if I join you?”

“It’s a free country,” I grumbled. I licked a drip of melting ice cream as it escaped the edge of the waxy chocolate shell.

Wayne set down a tray loaded with two cheeseburgers and a basket of fries and slid into the other side of the booth.

I nodded toward the food. “What happened to your diet?”

He patted his rounded belly affectionately. “Well, I did try to keep eating right in honor of Brittanie, but I was having a lot of stress after her death. I tried taking up running, but that didn’t take. Finally had to decide between maintaining my sobriety and my waistline. Sobriety won.”

After our divorce, I learned that my husband suffered from a sexual addiction. I didn’t begin to understand it, wasn’t even sure I believed in such a thing, but I knew he’d worked real hard to get his life back in control. If he needed to binge on nachos in order to keep Little Wayne corralled, so be it.

He dunked a fry in a paper cup of ketchup and popped it in his mouth. “I heard about your troubles.”

Good Lord. It hadn’t even been twenty-four hours since Char had been arrested. I pitched the half-finished cone in the empty onion ring basket and swiveled in my seat to dump them both in the trash.

“How is that even possible?” I wondered.

“Bad news travels fast in a small town.”

“Huh. Then how’d it take me nearly two decades to find out you were cheating on me with everything in a skirt?”

Wayne winced as though he’d been burned, and I instantly felt chagrined.

“Aw, jeez. I’m sorry, Wayne.”

He waved off my apology. “It’s okay. You’re right. I managed to cover my tracks pretty good. And there’s something about you that makes people protective. I think folks kept hush because they didn’t want to see you hurt.”

I laughed. “Guess that fad has passed.”

Wayne was tapping the excess ketchup from another fry, but he set it back in the basket, folded his arms on the table, and leaned in. “Tally, no one wanted to hurt you here.”

“But they did.”

“Yessir, I guess they did. But both Finn and Bree love you. Bree’s the one that called me, actually. Said I should come find you.”

“She called
you
?”

Wayne shrugged. “She was my sister-in-law for seventeen years. And she knows I want what’s best for you. Same as she does.”

I snorted.

“Tally,” he chided, “they did the deed eighteen years ago. Eighteen years. What’s the point in getting mad at them now for something they did way back then?”

I frowned at Wayne. He was right, dang it. The hurt was fresh and raw, but the injury was old. Real old.

“They slept together years ago,” I said, “but every day since they’ve made a choice to keep it secret.”

Wayne laughed. “Choice? You call that a choice? When exactly was Bree gonna tell you she slept with Finn? While we were on our honeymoon? Maybe when Sonny started courting her? After Alice was born? What would have been the point except to cause you pain?”

“Fair enough,” I conceded, “but what about Finn? He should have told me before we started dating again.”

“Really? Did you tell him about every shameful thing you ever did before you started seeing him again?”

I felt a bubble of impotent rage rising in my throat. “Why are you taking their side, Wayne? Why are you even here?”

He sighed. “I can’t help but think some of this is my fault. I burned you pretty bad, and I think maybe you’re taking it out on Finn.”

“You’re here to defend Finn?”

He dipped his chin and looked up at me with a “you know better” sort of look. “I’m here to do right by you, Tally. I can’t undo what I did, the hurt I caused you. But I don’t want to see you hurt now.”

“It’s not really in your power to stop it.”

“No. It’s not. It’s in your power.”

“Are you kidding? They’re the ones—”

“They did what they did. But it’s up to you how you react.”

I sat there, stunned, staring at my good ol’ boy ex. I couldn’t quite believe Wayne Jones was capable of spouting such pearls of wisdom.

He must have guessed my thoughts, because he turned redder than a hothouse tomato. “That’s something they teach us in Sex Addicts Anonymous. The only thing you can control is yourself.”

I reached across the table and laid a hand over his. “I just don’t think it’s that easy.”

“I didn’t say it was easy, Tally. But does Finn make you happy?”

I pulled my hand back. “He did.”

He nodded, as if I’d settled something for him. “Then you have to get past this. You can’t let pride rob you of happiness.”

Pride. Dang, I knew I wasn’t proud.

I was scared. Finn Harper could crush my heart with one wayward glance. I didn’t know if I could let a man—who was only too human—have that kind of power over me.

I looked out the window at the picnic tables across the parking lot. I’d been sitting on one of those very tables the night Finn Harper drove out of my life. He’d offered me his love, and I’d turned him down. At the time, I’d told him I couldn’t run off with him because I had to take care of my mama.

That was true. But it wasn’t the truth.

I’d said no to Finn because I was afraid of the unknown. Afraid to trust in something as insubstantial as love. Because I was desperate for the ordinary, the familiar, the secure.

Over the years, I came to realize those were foolish reasons to let go of love. I’d told Kyle that inertia was a poor reason to stay with someone. Turns out, it was a poor reason to lose someone, too.

Here I was again, back in the Tasty-Swirl parking lot, with a decision to make. Would I let Finn Harper slip out of my life again? Or, this time, would I close my eyes and leap into the abyss, trusting that he would catch me?

 

By the time I got home, Finn was sitting on my front stoop, right where I’d seen him the autumn before when he’d finally come back to Dalliance. He sat with his elbows resting on his knees, head in his hands, staring at the cement between his feet.

“Hey, Finn.”

His head jerked up at the sound of my voice, and even in the fading light of day, I could see the hope in his eyes.

“I got your message,” he said.

I settled onto the stoop next to him, tucking the skirt of my sundress around my knees. I felt sixteen.

“I’ve been thinking,” I said.

“Uh-huh.”

“Life’s complicated.”

A short laugh escaped him. “Amen.”

“I like to color inside the lines.”

“I know.”

“But the lines keep moving.”

He sighed. “I know.”

I swallowed hard. “I think I need to learn to just be happy with the color. Worry a little less about the lines.”

He laughed again, more softly. “You want to explain that for me?”

I shook my head. I wasn’t sure I could put the idea into words that made more sense than that. So I tried a different approach.

“I’ve been thinking a lot today about Kristen. I never did figure out where she was from, find her family.”

“I talked to Cal about that. He’s going to see if the Dalliance PD can track down her people.”

“Thanks.” I grabbed his hand, knotted my fingers with his. “But I guess my point is that Kristen became someone else. She was a stripper and a lawyer.”

“Sounds like the plot for one of those TV movies on the women’s networks.”

“Hush. I’m serious. You can’t ever erase your past, but you shouldn’t necessarily be judged by it.”

“Thank you.”

I shook my head. “Don’t thank me. I’m not doing you a favor. I’m doing this for me. Bree and Alice and Peachy, they’re my family, but so are you. Y’all are the colors in my world, and I couldn’t give you up any more than I could give up blue. Or pink. I don’t care if you fit in the lines, Finn. I just need you to fit in my life.

“I love you.”

My heart pounding, I squeezed his hand.

And he squeezed back.

With just a little advanced planning, you can turn storebought ice cream into a pretty, company-worthy dessert. This is a mix-and-match recipe: choose any three flavors of ice cream, any (or no) tasty tidbits for between the layers, and any flavoring for the fudge sauce. A few yummy suggestions from Tally’s ice cream imaginings follow.

 

 

 

 

1½ c. heavy cream
⅔ c. brown sugar
½ stick (4 Tbs.) butter
4 oz. good bittersweet chocolate, chopped
3 oz. unsweetened chocolate, chopped
1½ tsp. flavor extract
or
3 Tbs. flavored liqueur

 

For the terrine: Soften the ice creams by allowing them to sit in the refrigerator for about 20 minutes. Line a 9 × 5 loaf pan with parchment paper, so the paper overlaps all four edges. Spoon ice cream, one flavor at a time, in the pan, using the back of a kitchen spoon or an ice cream spade and creating reasonably even layers. Sprinkle nuts or candies between the first and second layers of ice cream. Remember that the layer on the bottom of the pan will be on the top when you unmold the terrine.

Return the loaf pan to the freezer for at least 30 minutes.

For the fudge sauce: Bring cream and sugar to boil over medium to medium-high heat, whisking occasionally. Boil, whisking until the sugar dissolves. Remove from heat and whisk in butter, then chocolates, and finally the extract or liqueur.

To serve: Remove the terrine from the freezer. Use the overhanging parchment paper to unmold the terrine onto a serving plate. Slice and serve topped with a generous drizzle of the fudge sauce.