Leave it to Max (Lori's Classic Love Stories Volume 1) (15 page)

“Nothing’s going on,” Garrett said.

“That’s what they all say. Now, let the lady
answer. Why are you so upset?”

“Is my mother all right?”

“She’s in jail.”

Rosie wouldn’t be in jail if she was hurt or
dying. “So all’s right with the world.”

“Your mother’s in jail a lot?” Garrett’s
voice was full of surprise and a healthy dose of wonder. That
figured. Only Garrett would think a jailhouse gramma
fascinating.

“Define
a lot."

Both Livy and Klein laughed. She must have
looked better, because he let her go, though he didn’t move
away.

Klein sobered first. No surprise there.
Though he had a beautiful laugh, he didn’t use it often enough.

“It’s a bit more serious this time,” he said.
“You need to come with me now, Livy. I’ll drive you.”

“You’ll have to. I took a cab.”

“I’ll take you,” Garrett offered. “We can
talk in the car.”

Livy didn’t even bother to look at him. “We
were through.”

His hand on her arm was as gentle as his
voice. “We’ve never been through, and you know it.”

If only he’d been rough and demanding; she
would have been able to resist. She did, however, move away from
his touch. “Detective, I’ll be right out.”

“Yeah, beat it,” Garrett said.

Klein eyed Garrett as he might a perpetrator
caught red-handed. “Butt out, pretty boy.”

“It’s all right, Klein.”

The detective glanced at Livy. “You
sure?”

“I’m sure. Two minutes, and I’ll be
there.”

Klein still didn’t move until Livy gave him a
tiny push.

“Let me go with you,” Garrett said.

“I’ve been dealing with Mama for years. I
don’t need your help.”

“You’ve never needed anyone’s help.”

“That’s not true. Once, I needed yours.”

He had the grace to wince. “I’m here
now.”

“Now is too late.”

“If you don’t need me, then you don’t need
the cop, either.”

“If the cop offers his help, I’ll take it.
Klein is one of the good guys.”

“Which makes me one of the bad?”

Livy had had enough. Dealing with a truant
Max, a disappearing mother and a reappearing dead lover was too
much for one woman to stand in a week. “You’re behaving like a
jealous boyfriend, and you have no right.”

“What rights do I have when it comes to
you?”

“None.”

A flicker of hurt crossed his face, but she
couldn’t afford to let that affect her.

“You’re the mother of my child. I can’t
forget that. I can’t stop thinking about it—”

His voice was low and urgent; his words made
something slick and weighty rumble within her.

“I didn’t get to feel him kick. I never
touched him beneath your skin. I missed all of it. How do you think
that makes me feel?’’

“Maybe the way I felt when you left me
behind?” Again he had the grace to wince, but he wouldn’t drop the
issue.

“How did you feel?”

“Alone, betrayed, worthless.”

Those three words made the anger return, and
Livy held on to it, let the feeling grow. She’d been angry at
Garrett for a very long time. Anger was an emotion she understood.
What she did not understand was the resurgence of lust for him, and
the hint of something stronger, deeper and much more dangerous that
she refused to put a name to.

She could shove his body away with her hands,
but to end this connection between them she would have to use
words.

“I meant nothing to you then. I don’t
understand why you give a damn now.”

The words fell between them, shattering any
momentary bond they’d shared.

“You believe that?”

“Of course I believe that.” Livy started for
the door.

“You couldn’t be further from the truth.”

She hesitated; something in his voice made
her want to believe, want to turn around and begin again what had
never truly ended.

Then a horn honked on the street, and the
phone began to ring, a startling shriek. Livy’s inertia vanished,
and she left Garrett behind as easily as he’d once left her.

* * *

Desperate for a distraction to keep him from
doing something more foolish than he already had, Garrett answered
the phone.

“I’ve been calling every hour on the hour,”
Andrew began.

“Was that you? And here I thought all that
ringing had to be the ghosts.”

“Is that what the book is about? Ghosts?”

“Okay.”

Silence descended on the other end of the
line. In Andrew’s case silence was rarely good.

“I’m coming down there.”

“Would you quit with that? I do not need a
sitter. I especially do not need someone with an imagination
deficit hanging around. You’ll frighten off all the creative
ghostly vibrations.”

Not to mention the Muse he’d completely
forgotten about the moment his son had walked into the house.

“I suppose you’re going to tell me the house
I rented you is haunted.”

“From what I hear, all the houses in Savannah
are haunted.” Which only proved how far gone his sensitivity was.
He hadn’t felt a thing but lonely since he’d moved into this place.
If anyone should feel a ghost, that someone should be Garrett
Stark.

“You do know there’s no such thing as ghosts,
don’t you, Garrett?”

“You do know there’s more to this world than
what we see, don’t you, Andrew?”

“Of course. There’s the money I haven’t made
yet.”

Sometimes Garrett wondered if Andrew was
kidding when he said stuff like that.

If ghosts existed, Andrew would never see one
because his world was confined to the tunnel of his vision, which
made Garrett and him the perfect team. Because Garrett’s inner
world was so large and unwieldy, he often had a hard time
addressing the realities of life. Of course, his inner world was
nonexistent lately, but Garrett would just keep that to
himself.

If it wasn’t for Andrew, he’d no doubt still
be writing with the stub of pencil he’d sharpened with his
pocketknife, on a legal pad he’d skipped breakfast to buy, in the
middle of a grungy apartment in Miami.

Those days had been tough, but there were
times Garrett missed the cold hard bite of life. He wasn’t quite
sure anymore how to get back some of the edge he’d had in the
beginning. Another thing that had led him here.

“You sound almost normal,” Andrew said. “But
there’s something wrong. I can smell it.”

“That’s not me. Have you been chewing up
editors and stashing their mangled bodies in the closet again? You
really have to stop that.”

“You never let me have any fun.”

The silence that followed their teasing spoke
louder than any words. Andrew was worried, which only made two of
them.

“What is this book about?”

“I’ll let you know.”

“What?”

The panic in that single word made Garrett do
something he hadn’t done in a long, long time. He lied—straight out
and with no remorse. There was no reason Andrew should improve his
ulcer until he had to.

“I’m superstitious about this one. I don’t
want to talk about the book until it’s done.”

“Okay.”

Though Andrew didn’t understand things that
were weird and spooky, he understood people who were. Or at least
pretended to. Authors had all sorts of superstitions,
eccentricities and routines that they used to convince themselves
the work would come out all right. Andrew knew better than to mess
with any one of them.

“Then I guess I won’t keep you.” Andrew still
didn’t sound convinced that Garrett wasn’t dancing naked beneath
the full moon, when he should be working like a good boy.

“And maybe you could stop calling me all the
time?”

If Garrett had actually been writing, the
phone would have driven him batshit. As it was—the phone was
driving him batshit.

“I’ll stop calling. I’m just a little
worried.”

At times Andrew was the mother Garrett had
never had.

“Relax. Have I ever let you down?”

“Now would not be the time to start.”

That was what Garrett liked about Andrew. The
man could always be counted on to leave him in the cheeriest of
moods.

The utter stillness of the house did not make
him want to write, as it was supposed to. Instead, without Andrew
for a distraction, what Garrett wanted to forget he could only
remember.

Livy.

An autumn wind casted through the window,
ruffling his hair with the scent of the river, stirring moist cool
night across his face. Still he burned for her, deep down where no
breeze could ever cool him.

Because of the ghosts in his past that
wouldn’t stop haunting him, Garrett had rarely looked back.
Instead, he’d always looked forward—next town, next book, next
adventure. Because whenever he had looked back, Garrett had seen
Livy and ached for her.

Why did he keep teasing himself with tiny
tastes of a woman who despised him? For that matter, why did she
keep giving him small sips? To torment him? Or because she could no
more stop the pull of the past than he could.

The joy he’d once found in Savannah had been
the deepest he’d ever known. Yet this time all joy seemed lost to
him—except when he gazed into the face of his son.

He should focus on Max, leave Livy alone. But
he knew that no matter his good intentions, if she let him touch
her he would. Then he’d lose himself in Livy the way he had the
last time, until he’d become afraid there would soon be nothing
left of himself.

She didn’t believe he’d ever cared for her.
She thought she’d meant nothing. She couldn’t be further from the
truth.

To save himself he’d run away, and had ended
up losing more than he’d ever imagined when he’d left a part of
himself behind.

Livy said she didn’t need him. Once, Garrett
had said such things, too. It had taken him years to realize that
sometimes what he said he needed the least was what he really
wanted the most.

Could that be true of Livy, as well?

As soon as Livy snapped her seat belt into
place, Klein put the car into gear. Although she would have liked
nothing better than to lean her head against the seat and rest,
Livy didn’t have the time or the luxury.

“What’s the charge this time? Civil
disobedience? Creating a public nuisance? Littering? Soliciting?
What?”

Klein gave her a slow sideways glance.
“Theft.”

“No way.” Livy’s response was automatic.
“Impossible. My mother is the least covetous person I know. What on
earth would she steal?”

That slow glance came again, but this time
Klein’s lips twitched. “A goose.”

“She didn’t.”

“The sisters say otherwise.”

Livy should have known this was coming. She
should have expected it. Her mother had been fuming over the
sisters’ ghost goose for months now, and she hadn’t been fuming
silently. Everyone in Savannah knew how Rosie Frasier felt about
that goose. What should have surprised Livy was that Rosie had
waited this long to take action.

“What, exactly, do the sisters say?”

Klein didn’t answer right away, instead
concentrated on the road as he negotiated a one-way square.

Savannah was beautiful, ancient and special.
But the historical section was difficult to navigate. There were no
cross streets, only square upon square. To get from one side to the
other, a driver needed to be familiar with the streets, then drive
up some, down others and around and around at times. Which made it
much easier to walk.

At last Klein came out of the one-way
roundabout and returned his attention to Livy. “Rosie felt the
goose was being exploited.”

“Tell me something I don’t know. With her,
someone’s always being exploited.”

“She called for its emancipation.”

“And?”

“The sisters say she emancipated it.”

“I was afraid of that. She’ll give it
back.”

“You really think so?”

Livy opened her mouth, shut it again, then
scratched her nose. “We could pay for it?”

“That would work with any other goose. But
the reason the sisters are so mad, the reason they’re pressing
criminal charges...”

“Besides the fact that they’ve got the feud
of their lifetime going with Rosie?”

“Besides that, I hear this goose is
exceptionally rare.”

Livy started seeing those black flecks again.
Only this time they were shaped like dollar signs. “How rare? Give
me numbers, Klein.”

“Not money rare. Trained rare.”

“Trained?” Livy scoffed. “The thing stays in
the yard. I’ll buy them a poodle.”

But Klein was already shaking his head. “They
want their goose back. Nothing else will do. Your mother had better
cough up one trained goose quick.”

“She will if I have to give her the Heimlich
myself.”

Klein slowed to the curb. Livy’s gaze went
from her darkened home to the lights next door. “I should probably
leave Max here rather than drag him off to see Gramma in jail.”

“I don’t think it’ll scar him for life to see
Rosie in jail. Might help him to understand where she spends so
much of her time.”

“Let’s hope so.” Livy shoved open the car
door.

“Does Max know?”

She glanced back at Klein, puzzled.
“What?”

“That Stark is his father.”

Could a person’s heart really stop? For an
instant, Livy thought hers just might. “W-why would you say that?
Max’s father is d-d-dead.”

“You never stutter unless you’re lying. You
can’t fool me. I detect things for a living.”

“When did you detect this?”

“A minute after I met the man. You noticed I
didn’t like him.”

“I wondered what your problem was. I didn’t
think you’d suddenly come down with a case of undying love for
me.”

“Not that you wouldn’t be worth it,
Counselor, but I make a much better friend than a lover.”