Tangled Thing Called Love: Life and Love on the Lam (A Loveswept Contemporary Romance)

by Juliet Rosetti

  It was Channing Blumquist! She was on the stage of the Quail Hollow High School Auditorium. She trilled her last note, flatting on the you in the key of C, then bowed, smiled, and thanked the audience.

  Except there was no audience.

  Icy prickles skittered down Mazie’s spine. This was weird. But maybe there was a simple explanation—maybe Channing was rehearsing for the pageant.

  The camera angle never changed. It was a stationary camera, Mazie realized, aimed at one spot. Holding a cord microphone, Channing walked across the empty stage until she was right up next to the camera, her face filling the screen. “Tell us a little about yourself, Miss Blumquist?” she said in a low, masculine-sounding voice.

  “Well, I don’t usually like to talk about myself,” Channing said in her normal, high-pitched voice. “I’m just an ordinary girl who likes long walks on the beach, collecting stuffed animals, and supporting the Fighting Bobwhites.”

  Girl wasn’t exactly appropriate, Mazie thought. Channing was not Sweet Sixteen in this video; in fact she looked close to her current age—too old to be talking about stuffed animals and supporting the team.

  “In my spare time I like to hang out with my friends at the mall.” She giggled girlishly. “I guess you could say I’m just a typical teenager.”

  Channing paused, her eyebrows shooting up into her perfectly styled hair, as though listening to a question only she could hear. “My goals? Well, beauty queens have the stereotype of being dumb, but I have a really high IQ. Not to brag on myself, but I’ve been accepted into medical school. After I get my doctor diploma I plan to set up practice in a poor African country such as Malaysia.”

  Whoa! First-degree cognitive dissonance! Was this a parody?

  Channing took a deep breath, then made her voice low and dramatic. “And now the moment you’ve all been waiting for—it’s time to announce our winner.” She bent to a boom box sitting on a folding chair, and pressed a button. The old Miss America theme blared out. “Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Miss Quail Hollow of 2001—Channing Blumquist!”

  The film went black for a few seconds before the videotape resumed. The camera angle had changed; the camera was now positioned at the end of the portable runway, which was swathed in red paper tablecloths. An amateurishly hand-lettered banner reading Miss Quail Hollow Pageant 2001 was draped above the stage. Channing strode out onto the runway. She’d changed into a white gown and was holding a bouquet of supermarket roses. A sash ran diagonally from her shoulder to her hip. It read Miss Quail Hollow 2001. A glittering tiara sat atop her head.

  Channing glided along the runway, waving and blowing kisses to the empty auditorium. “I love all of you,” she warbled to the vacant seats, tears brimming in her nobody’s-home eyes.

  Bette Davis, Mazie thought, wearing little girl clothes in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, reliving her moments of fame as a child star.

  “Thank you for this honor.” Channing whispered, wiping tears with an extended pinky. “I promise to be the very best Miss Quail Hollow ever, ever, ever!”

  Some guys, especially athletes, never get over high school. The moments of glory on the field are the high points of their lives, and nothing after that—marriage, jobs, parenthood—can compare.

  Some women are like that too. The Prom Queen, the cheerleading captain, the pom squad star—nothing ever comes close to the adrenaline rush of having every eye in the school on you, the girls envying you, the boys desiring you.

  How much trouble had Channing gone to in order to re-create her eighteen-year-old self? She must have arranged the whole show to take place late at night, when no one was in the building. She’d have had to steal keys to the auditorium. She’d have needed to unlock the storage compartment under the stage, drag out the heavy runway and wrestle it into place by herself. She’d have needed to turn on the auditorium lights and the spotlights, swing the curtains into place, set up the sound system, arrange the camera on a tripod and set it on a timer. She’d have had to buy dresses, shoes, gloves, flowers.

  What was the point? Was it to compensate for her life being a series of disappointments and disasters? She’d dropped out of college, narrowly escaped going to jail for stalking and harassment, been divorced by her husband, and now lived with her mother in a hometown she’d probably never wanted to see again.

  Channing moved closer to the camera. She looked lovely but vacant, the kind of person who believed Malaysia was in Africa. Mazie stared at Channing’s tiara and creepy-crawlies ran up and down her arms. The letters QH were elaborately entwined into the hearts that formed the peak of the tiara, and there was a tiny bird, a quail, centered between the hearts.

  It was the tiara Fawn Fanchon had been crowned with. No one had seen it for thirteen years.

  “I should have won, you know.” The voice came from the chair, making Mazie’s heart jump violently. Channing Blumquist had been sitting there silently this whole time. “She stole my crown. All I did was take it back.”

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Channing had changed out of her parade gown into a navy hoodie and sweatpants. She looked misleadingly normal. She smiled, revealing her perfect teeth. “Like my little place? I come here when I need to get away from my mother.”

  “It’s nice.” Mazie started backing toward the door.

  “Uncle Buzzy told me you’d be coming back here for your truck. I found your keys under the floor mat—that’s where he always leaves them.” She pulled the keys out of her pocket and jingled them. “I’ve been waiting for you to show up.”

  Uh-oh.

  Not wanting to turn her back on Channing, Mazie kept reversing, her skirt acting like a street sweeper, knocking aside a stack of magazines and a beer bottle.

  “You’re not running away, are you, Mazie?” Channing’s uninflected voice came out even flatter than usual. “You want your keys, don’t you?”

  “Toss ’em.”

  Channing shook her head, bouncing the keys on her palm. “You’re a disgrace, you know that, Mazie? Your makeup’s smeared, your hair’s a rat’s nest, and that dress—you look like you’re fleeing from the burning of Atlanta.”

  Fleeing. Yes, excellent idea. Mazie took another backward step, sensing that the door was just a step behind her.

  “That ‘Alley Cat’ number—what a joke! You fumbled most of the steps and your tail flew off—but the judges loved it! It’s so gosh-darned unfair!”

  “Then you shouldn’t have syruped my keyboard. That was you, right?”

  “It was scary. I could have gotten caught.”

  “And my gown?”

  “It wasn’t fair, you having a dress nicer than mine! I was only going to make one tiny cut. But somehow once I started ripping, I couldn’t stop. It felt so good!” Channing studied Mazie, frowning. “I don’t get it. You do everything wrong but people still like you. You’re like her!”

  “Like Fawn?” Mazie breathed.

  “Fawn was a piece of trash. She lived in a friggin’ trailer. She bought her clothes at Goodwill. Half her relatives were in jail, and the other half—”

  Mazie bolted, wrenching the blimp through the narrow doorway, jumping the steps and tearing back the way she’d come, bouncing off things in the dark but not caring, intent only on reaching the back door.

  Here it was, straight ahead, and she had a lead, but Channing was close, pounding along behind. Mazie skidded on the wet floor and nearly smacked headfirst into the back door. She wrenched at the knob, but it refused to turn. Rotating, jimmying, hammering, cursing at it—nothing worked. She was certain it’d been open when she’d come in. Someone must have entered the garage since then, leaving that swamp on the floor and locking the door. Buzzy? Or had someone been in the garage all the while, watching her flounder around in the dark?

  Lights abruptly flickered on all over the garage, the brightness so dazzling it seared her eyeballs. Channing stood a few feet away in front of the master switch box.

  Her voice was high and resentful.
“I practiced for that pageant all through senior year. I rehearsed my talent routine every night. Mama hired a consultant to teach me how to walk and make speeches. We spent months shopping for my gown until we found exactly the right one. And then that little piece of swamp trash stole my crown right from under my nose!”

  Channing was probably long overdue for her fifty-thousand-mile mental health checkup, Mazie thought; she’d completely slipped off the lube rack of reality. Veering around Channing, Mazie took off toward the front of the garage, dodging in and out between parked vehicles; here was Scully’s pickup, here a delivery truck, there a classic Mustang, and there—just beyond a burgundy panel van—was the big bay door!

  She raced toward it, but Channing, who knew the garage inside out, had taken a shortcut and suddenly shot out from behind the van, holding a heavy steel mallet. Snagging Mazie’s hair, she yanked her forward, swinging the mallet down at her head. Mazie reacted instinctively, lunging against Channing’s torso to get inside the swing. The mallet struck the van instead, gouging a deep dent in its side. Channing struck again, and this time the mallet hit Mazie’s hip, but the acres of skirts acted as a barrier. Frantically Mazie scrabbled for a weapon, thinking how bizarre this was, clamping herself to the bosom of someone intent on bashing her brains out.

  Channing was amazingly strong, her athlete’s body seething with hard muscle. If this became an endurance contest, Channing would win. They were both panting like long-distance runners, and Mazie could smell Channing’s sweat. Something pointy jabbed against Mazie’s thigh. The Scarlett O’Hara parasol! Ripping it free, Mazie gripped it by the handle and without bothering to take aim, jabbed the point with all her strength into the first part of Channing’s body she could reach—her waist!

  Screeching in agony, Channing released Mazie and dropped the mallet. Her hand flew to her right side, where the parasol’s sharp tip had gouged into the flesh and was protruding from the front of her body, just above the hipbone. Mazie yanked out the parasol and blood bubbled from the wound—it didn’t appear serious, but it had a lot of shock value, Channing’s eyes went wide. Then she opened her mouth and howled.

  Close the deal before your enemy regains her balance; Mazie had learned that in prison. She slammed Channing against the van’s side, leaned into her, assumed a my-ovaries-clank-when-I-walk expression, and thrust the bloodied point of the parasol straight up into Channing’s left nostril. “Shut up,” Mazie whispered. Another bit of Cellblock 19 wisdom: A whisper is scarier than a shout.

  Channing stopped screaming, but her chest heaved and snot flooded out of her other nostril. “Move a muscle and I jam this thing right up into your brain,” Mazie hissed. “If it doesn’t kill you, you’ll live in a wheelchair for the rest of your life.”

  Sheer malarkey. Probably the worst Channing would suffer would be a sinus headache, but Mazie was making this up on the fly and her mind and mouth weren’t necessarily aligned.

  “Tell me about Fawn,” she demanded, still in that menacing whisper.

  “I don’t know!” Channing moaned, her right hand clapped to her stab wound, her left hand flopping around aimlessly.

  Mazie snatched up the mallet. “Maybe I ought to test your reflexes,” she snarled, tapping the mallet against Channing’s leg. “We’ll start with your kneecap. How much damage do you think this hammer could do, Channing? Picture yourself hobbling down the runway.”

  “Please,” Channing pleaded, tears pouring down her face. “I don’t know anything.”

  Channing was truly terrified. If she’d been thinking straight she would have realized she was twice as strong as Mazie and only had to knee her in the stomach to make her crumple.

  Maybe she was going about this the wrong way, Mazie thought. Maybe she needed to appeal to Channing’s vanity. You catch more flies with honey and all that.

  “Channing,” she said, using her normal voice, but still keeping the parasol wedged in Channing’s nose. “I’m sorry I hurt you. That cut on your side is just a little puncture wound. It probably won’t even need stitches. You can stick a really thin bandage over it and it won’t show under your gown. That way you can still compete in the pageant tomorrow.”

  That pageant would be taking place in the state mental health hospital, but Mazie didn’t mention that part.

  Channing’s sobs tapered off. “If my hand slips, though, Channing, this thing will slice right through your nose, and your face will be horribly disfigured. You wouldn’t want that, would you?” Mazie asked.

  Channing just moaned.

  “You can still win the pageant, Channing,” Mazie continued, adopting a soothing tone. “You’re beautiful, you’re talented, you’re nice to everyone—”

  Was that laying it on too thick? No, Channing was definitely calming down, her eyes locking on Mazie, wanting to trust her.

  “Listen—this was supposed to be a surprise, but it’s too good to keep to myself,” Mazie said. “I’ll tell you if you promise to act all surprised tomorrow, okay?”

  Channing blinked her eyes rapidly. Was that a yes?

  “Ready for the surprise? Okay, here it is—back on the boat, we voted you Miss Congeniality.”

  “You … did?” Channing breathed.

  “Yes—congratulations! And I bet you win the title, too. One of the judges told us they’d made a mistake in their calculations—you’re actually in first place by fifteen points. You’re going to win Miss Congeniality and Miss Quail Hollow. A double whammy!”

  Channing jerked in surprise.

  “Keep still. If your face is messed up, they won’t let you win. You have to tell me what you did to Fawn.”

  Silence. More time ticked by while Channing sobbed, sniffled, gulped, and hiccuped. This wasn’t going to work, Mazie thought. Her arms were getting tired from holding the parasol and the mallet. The rain was coming down harder now, thumping on the corrugated steel roof like spoons being chucked down a mine shaft.

  “She cheated,” Channing said, snuffling.

  Mazie’s attention shot back to her. “Fawn cheated?”

  “Mama promised I’d win. When Fawn got into first place Mama took money out of Buzzy’s safe. She rubbed grease on it. She said I should stick the money in Fawn’s bag. So I did. Just a fifty-dollar bill, though—the rest I kept for myself because Mama never gave me enough allowance. I watched the police officer come. I thought he’d take Fawn to jail. But he didn’t and she—Fawn—won the whole thing!”

  Channing started crying. She no longer seemed aware of where she was or that the tip of an umbrella was jammed up her nose. “I thought Mama would make them take the crown away from Fawn and give it to me, but Mama said it was too late. She said it was my own fault for not beating that trashy girl. But I did try! I put the food coloring on her dress and started those rumors—”

  Above the clatter of the rain Mazie thought she heard another sound—a cough, or someone clearing his throat? Mazie whirled around. She couldn’t see anything, but her senses were on alert now, warning her of danger. She peered into the shadows, where anyone could be hiding. Her gut instinct was warning her to get out, but she needed the truth from Channing first.

  “I had a key to Fawn’s truck. Mama said Buzzy should never have given her that truck. I unlocked the truck. It had a front seat and a skinny backseat. I scrunched down in the back under an old coat. I waited and waited. Fawn was so selfish, making me wait—my legs got all cramped and it was hot. Finally she got in and started driving. I waited until we were out in the country, then when she braked at a stop sign I lunged up over the seat.”

  Channing’s pale green eyes stared into Mazie’s. “Then the accident happened,” she said in a little-girl voice.

  “What accident was that, Channing?” Mazie asked softly, sliding the parasol out of her nose.

  “The thing with my hands around her neck. I’ve got strong hands. Fawn had a skinny little neck.”

  “You strangled her?”

  “Accidentally,” Channing whispered. Sh
e took her hand off the wound in her side and used it to wipe her nose, leaving blood smeared across her mouth. “It was Fawn’s fault, not mine. Mazie, are you sure they voted me Miss Congeniality?”

  Oh, brother. “Yeah, definitely. You’ll get a trophy cup with your name etched on it. What did you do with Fawn’s body?”

  “Right there,” Channing pointed.

  “Where?” Mazie half-turned, trying to figure out what she was pointing at.

  “The grease pit.” Channing giggled. “You’re almost standing on it. You’re sure I won’t need stitches for this cut, Mazie? Because I hate getting stitches.”

  “How did the body get in there?”

  “After I … had the accident, I drove Fawn’s truck around for a while. I didn’t know what to do. So I went to Dukie’s apartment. He just got back from a bar and he was drunk. When I told him about Fawn, he called me a retard—you shouldn’t call people that, should you, Mazie? But I told him I’d let him do those nasty things with me he was always pestering for, and he agreed to help. He said we should dump the body in Buzzy’s grease pit because it never got cleaned out and nobody would notice Fawn’s body stinking because the chemicals would cover the smell.”

  “What about the truck?” Mazie asked.

  “I drove it to that road in the swamp. Dukie and I knew that place because we used to party out there. I found Fawn’s shoes in the truck. They flew off her feet because she kicked a lot while I was chok—while I was accidentally doing that bad thing. I tossed the shoes and the bouquet down by the creek so people would think Fawn drowned. But I kept the sash and the crown because they were mine. Dukie followed me on his motorcycle and then we both—”

  “Channy, you need to learn to shut your stupid mouth,” said a male voice.

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Mazie whirled around.

  Not fast enough. She lost the precious instant when she still could have run. He stepped out of the shadows, wrenched the mallet from her grip, and twisted her arm behind her back, all in one fluid motion.