Hollyhock Ridge (27 page)

“Once you see how wrong it can go, you’re bound to take it
more seriously,” he said. “It’s risky to love people.”

“Do you want to get married again?”

“I do,” he said. “I miss having somebody in my corner.”

“Someone you can count on.”

“Only if they’re not pretending,” he said. “I guess I never
had that with Karla; I just thought I did.”

“I’m sorry you had to go through that,” she said. “You
deserve better.”

“I’m starting to think I’ve found better,” he said.

“We’ll see,” she said. “Let’s walk.”

As they started off, Sonny grabbed her hand and held it,
swinging it between them as they went.

“This is nice,” he said.

“It is,” she said.

When they returned from their walk, sweaty and clammy from
the cool night air, Sonny said, “I need a shower; do you mind if I run home
real quick?”

“Use mine,” Kay said. “We’ll take turns.”

He paused and Kay looked at him. He was smiling in a way
that made him look years younger, and in his expression she could see the
teenager he once was.

“You know,” he said. “It would conserve water if we shared.”

Kay was shocked, and her face must’ve shown it.

He winked and nodded toward the bathroom.

“C’mon,” he said. “We’re grownups. We’re neither of us
fashion models, and that’s okay. Let’s do something fun.”

“I like to think of myself as a green candidate,” Kay said.

“Well then,” he said. “Maybe we’ve stumbled upon a better
stress reliever than ice cream.”

When the alarm clock went off at 4:00 a.m., Claire moaned.
She’d been awake for most of the night, obsessing about Laurie and Ed, worrying
about what to do with her life, and resisting the urge to mix up some cookie
dough.

The sleep she did get was muddled up with dreams about Knox
and Anne Marie. In the dream, it was Knox’s funeral, and Anne Marie was dressed
in widow’s black, but she kept flashing everyone with her bright red panties.
In the dream, Claire kept trying to get Anne Marie to cover up. “Cover up,” she
kept telling the woman, but Anne Marie just laughed and flipped up her skirt at
all the men in attendance. The words “cover up” were still reverberating in
Claire’s ears as she got out of bed.

A hot shower helped a little, and two cups of coffee helped
even more. By the time her father got up at 5:00 a.m. Claire was dressed and
able to form complete sentences.

Claire took Mackie Pea and Junior outside to do their
business, and found her father’s big cat, Chester, asleep on top of the
newspapers in the recycling bin. Since Mackie Pea and the kitten had taken over
Ian’s affections, Chester had taken to living outside. Claire used a broom to
protect the kitten from the growling cat, and finally got the two little pets
back inside safely.

Ed was standing in her living room.

“What are you doing here?” she asked him.

“Ian’s going to keep me company while I deliver papers,” he
said.

“I’m riding shotgun,” her father said.

“I thought it might help,” Ed said. “I’ll take him to the
depot for breakfast and then to the station afterward.”

“Thank you,” Claire said. “But what I really need is to be
twenty-two again.”

“You and me both,” Ed said.

At the bakery, Claire consulted the instruction sheet that
Melissa had left for her. She had helped her Aunt Bonnie before, but now that
it was up to her to do everything, and not just be the assistant, she found she
had forgotten how to do most of it. Consequently, the croissants came out of
the oven in interesting, distinctly un-croissant-like shapes, and she must have
added too much baking powder, or was a little too generous in filling the
muffin papers, because all of the muffins had exploded at the top as they
baked.

She was a little embarrassed at what she put on display in
the bakery case, so she made a sign that said “student driver - everything 10%
off today.” The customers laughed at her wares, but they still bought them.

“It ain’t pretty but it tastes the same,” one of the
regulars said. “And the coffee’s better, in my opinion.”

By the time Ruthie Postlethwaite showed up at noon, moaning
about her own back and feet, Claire was more than ready for a break.

“I’ve got my daughter coming in after a bit,” Ruthie said,
as she surveyed the array of pitiful baked goods that were left. “Why don’t you
take the afternoon off.”

Claire was so thankful she hugged the woman.

“Why don’t we switch tomorrow,” Ruthie said. “I’ll take the
morning shift and do the baking, and then you can do the afternoon.”

Claire hugged her again, and as she left, pretended not to
see Ruthie slide the last of her overblown muffins into the trash can.

Trick Rodefeffer was kicked back in his rolling chair, feet
on his desk, sipping a beer, when his wife, Sandy, let Claire into his office.

“Whassup, beautiful?” he asked her, jerking his head back
and raising his beer to greet her.

“Richard!” Sandy said. “Put that away and sit up straight.
What have I told you about that?”

“Sure, sure, sure,” Trick said, as he struggled to comply,
only to tip his chair over and fall on the floor.

Sandy left the room shaking her head and muttering under her
breath.

When Trick got to his feet, he attempted to brush the
spilled beer off his polo shirt and slick his wispy blonde hair over the
thinning spot on the top of his head at the same time.

“Well, well, well. Claire Fitzpatrick, you are looking
well,” he said, in what she knew he thought was a suave manner. “To what do I
owe the pleasure of such a beautiful woman’s company on this fine morning?”

“It’s past noon, actually,” Claire said. “I’m interested in
looking at the tea room. I understand it’s for sale.”

“Yes indeedy, yes, yes, yes,” Trick said. “Meredith gave me
a key, if I can find it …”

He looked through the tangle of papers on his desk, opened
and closed drawers, patted his pockets, and looked around the office as if it
might be anywhere.

Sandy came back in with a key and handed it to Claire, along
with a folder.

“Here’s the key and the details,” she said. “After you’re
done, be sure and bring them back to
me
, not him.”

“There they are!” Trick said. “Thank you, my dear, my angel,
my pet, thank you so very much …”

He was cut off by Sandy saying, “I’m going to lunch” and
slamming the front door behind her.

“Shall we?” he asked Claire, and gestured for her to precede
him.

As they walked down Rose Hill Avenue, Trick greeted everyone
he met with a “what’s up?” or “hey, how ya doin?”

“I was so sorry to hear about your brother,” Claire said.

“Oh, yeah,” Trick said. “A terrible thing, so terrible, for
sure.”

“So it was an accident?”

“I don’t know,” Trick said. “The police seem to think
someone killed him.”

“Any idea who might have wanted to?”

“No idea,” Trick said. “I can’t imagine.”

“Had you seen him that day?”

“No, no, no,” Trick said. “I talked to him on the phone
earlier, but he was fine then.”

“Why did he call?”

“He was reminding me we were supposed to go to a meeting at
the funeral home at 12:30, to talk to Stuart about some stuff. He said he was
leaving as soon as he hung up, and I was to meet him in the back parking lot
beforehand. I made it more or less on time, but then Knox didn’t show up. The
next thing you know we heard sirens and then the cops showed up.”

“When is the funeral?”

“I don’t know,” Trick said. “Sandy does all that stuff;
seems like she said Friday or Saturday; I don’t always listen as well as I
should. She’ll tell me when it’s time to go or if I need to do anything.”

“I guess this means you’ll inherit everything.”

“Nothing left to inherit,” he said. “There was a little
trust money left after Aunt Mamie died, but there are all these debts, apparently,
and attorney fees. It’s just a huge mess, really huge. Sandy’s on top of it;
she’ll tell me what I need to know.”

“You and Knox were close?”

“Yeah, you’d think so, but, no, not really,” he said. “I
kind of could never do anything right where ole Knox was concerned, ya know? He
was the brains of the outfit, and he just told me what I needed to do and when
I needed to do it. I’m not that smart, I mean, I know it, Sandy knows it, and
Knox sure as hell knew it. I never could seem to dig into anything and make a
go of it. This real estate thing, well, Sandy runs the show. I turn up and do
what she tells me to do. It’s a living, I mean, we do all right.”

“Well, it must be awful to lose Knox so soon after losing
your Aunt Mamie.”

“I don’t think either of them liked me very much,” Trick
said. “But I’ll miss them.”

His eyes were glassy, and not only from drink. He tried to
smile and failed, cleared his throat, stuck his hands down in his pockets, and
chewed his lower lip.

As much as Claire disrespected Trick for being such a
drunken womanizer, she found herself feeling sorry for him now.

She guessed even rotten bastards could have sorrows.

The tea room was also a gift shop, with a few small round
tables and spindly chairs at the back. Meredith’s taste ran to pastels, preppy
pink and green, and ruffles. Everything was covered in a fine layer of dust,
and beyond the combined smell of all the scented candles and tea, Claire
smelled something rank. She wrinkled her nose, and Trick noticed.

“Sewer issues,” he said. “Easily remedied; don’t worry about
it.”

Claire went behind the counter and through the door to the
backroom. Trick switched on the lights, and it was immediately evident that
someone, probably Meredith, had been living there. There was an air mattress,
heaps of clothing, some groceries, and an open laptop on the floor. Claire
touched the laptop touchpad with the toe of her shoe and the screen lit up,
exposing an open browser page. It looked as though someone had recently left.

“I maybe should have given her a call to let her know we
were coming,” Trick said. “She could have cleaned up a little.”

“What’s upstairs?” Claire asked.

“Storage,” Trick said.

“What’s that door?”

“A bathroom.”

Claire opened the door and flipped on a light, revealing the
origin of the rank smell, along with a makeshift clothesline that had several
hundred dollar bills clothes-pinned to it. It looked as though Meredith had
bleached them, but even as faded as they were, some were still stained a light
pink. Claire held her breath and closed the door, thankful to find that Trick
was not paying attention.

“Where’s she staying?”

“I don’t know,” he said with a shrug. “She gave me her cell
number. The phone in here’s been disconnected.”

“Trick,” Claire said. “I wonder if you wouldn’t call Meredith
and ask her to come over? I’d like to ask her some questions about the
business.”

“Sure, sure, sure,” he said. “No problemo.”

He patted all his pockets and then grimaced.

“Looks like I left my cell phone at the office; do you mind
if I run back over and get it?”

“No, I’ll wait,” Claire said.

“You wanna beer?”

“No, but thanks.”

As soon as Trick left, Claire texted Sarah to tell her where
she was. Sarah texted back that she was not far away and would be there shortly.

Claire crouched down to look at Meredith’s browsing history.
Prices on airline tickets, a moving company quote request page, and her bank
log-in page were the last three sites she visited.

“Find anything interesting?” someone said from behind
Claire.

Claire jumped up, startled.

It was Meredith.

Meredith was a small, brittle-thin woman with narrow lips
and a permanently disapproving expression. She was dressed in her best
political wife pearls and a black linen pantsuit. She had smeared some bright
pink lipstick on her mouth, and her mousy hair was held back by a black linen
headband. She was livid, of course, as Claire could plainly see by her
compressed lips and frown.

“I’m so sorry,” Claire said. “You scared me.”

“Caught you is more like it,” Meredith said. “Who are you?
What are you doing here?”

Claire blessed her good fortune that Meredith did not
recognize her. It was only a few months earlier that Claire had caught Pip and
Meredith having a lover’s tiff in this very building, and then had been present
in Knox’s office when Meredith attacked him. Both of those times Claire had
been dressed in designer clothing and high heels, her hair expertly blown out
and her face covered in what constituted fashionable war paint.

Today Claire didn’t have on any makeup, and her hair was
pulled back in a messy bun on the back of her head. She wore blue jeans and a T-shirt,
which was still covered in flour from her morning’s work. In her mother’s puffy
white tennis shoes, she was several inches shorter than in her heels.
Evidently, she didn’t look like herself, or more accurately, she finally did.

“Trick brought me to look at the place,” Claire said. “I’m
thinking of buying it.”

Meredith’s demeanor immediately changed. Her eyebrows shot
up and her thin lips stretched into a fake smile. Her eyes, however, stayed
alert and shrewd.

“I’m so sorry things are such a mess,” Meredith said,
extending her hand out to Claire. “I’m Meredith Stanhope Huckle Rodefeffer.”

“Rebecca Fitzpatrick,” Claire said, using her middle name,
and wincing under the crushing claw that gripped her sore hand.

A brief expression passed over Meredith’s face; only for a
split-second, and it did not reflect a positive emotion.

“Are you any relation to the woman who owns the bakery?”
Meredith said.

“She’s my aunt.”

“A stubborn woman, your aunt, but she makes delicious
teacakes,” Meredith said. “I couldn’t afford them for my shop, actually, which
was such a shame; she really is a formidable negotiator, and difficult to deal
with, but such a talented baker.”

“Maybe you could tell me a little about this place,” Claire
said.

“You get the entire inventory,” Meredith said. “Everything
you see here conveys. Do you have any retail experience?”

“No,” Claire said. “I worked in the bakery when I was in
high school, but only helped out in the kitchen.”

“Are you married; do you have children?”

“No, it’s just me,” Claire said.

“What do you do?”

“Well, right now, nothing,” Claire said. “I’m looking for
something to do.”

Meredith’s fake friendliness began to slip.

“Have you been pre-approved for a mortgage? I told Richard I
couldn’t waste my time with local looky-loos who weren’t serious.”

“I can pay cash,” Claire said.

Meredith cast a dubious look over Claire’s attire and
sniffed a little.

“So you say,” she said. “Where is my brother-in-law?”

“He went back to the office to get his phone and call you,”
Claire said.

“How nice,” she said. “Leaving you to pillage the place and
snoop in my computer. You look familiar to me. Have we met before?”

Claire scooted around Meredith and backed out into the
retail space. She didn’t want to be trapped in the back room with someone she
had once seen bludgeon a man with a collectible coin box, and she didn’t dare
turn her back on her.