Perhaps. But... “That’s how I feel about Todd, though. Like a brother. Not like a man I want to spend the rest of my life with. Or a man I want to share my bed with. If you’re sleeping with Sheriff Satterfield, surely you can understand that.”
Mother turned as red as a cherry, and came close to choking on her drink. “Savannah...!”
“Well, I’m sorry,” I said defensively, “but it’s important, you know. Bradley left me because of it.”
“I’m sure it was Bradley’s failing and not yours, darling,” Mother managed. She was still flushed, and looked like she’d rather be anywhere else right now, than here with me having this conversation. I took pity on her, and put my glass down on the table and rolled to my feet.
“I think I’ll go out for a while.”
“Now?” Mother glanced at the window, where darkness was pressing against the glass. “It’s late.”
“Not that late.” Only just going on eight o’clock. “I’ll be careful.”
Mother got to her feet, too, and followed me into the hallway. “Where are you going, darling?” I could sense the hopeful question she didn’t ask. To see Todd...?
“Just out. For a drive. I need some air.”
“Oh,” Mother said, disappointed. “All right, darling. You have your key?”
“Of course. But I won’t be long. I’m just going to...” I hesitated, “drive around town for a little while.”
Mother nodded.
“I’ll be back within the hour. And if I’m not, I’ll call.”
“All right, darling,” Mother said again. And this time she smiled.
* * *
At some point during the afternoon, I had looked up Yvonne McCoy’s address in the Maury County telephone book, and now I plugged it into the GPS navigation system and started driving.
After a few minutes, I passed Beulah’s Meat’n Three. It was still open, but the parking lot was deserted. It’s a breakfast and lunch place mostly, and doesn’t get a big dinner crowd, and what dinner business they’d had was over now. I slowed down as I drove past, to peer through the lighted windows. All the tables looked empty, and the waitress who was leaning on the counter talking to the cook wasn’t Yvonne.
She lived in small community called Damascus, not too far from Rafe’s other teenage conquest, Elspeth Caulfield. I drove past Elspeth’s house on the way to Yvonne’s, as a matter of fact. A big, dilapidated Victorian house in dire need of some paint and new windows. It was dark except for a single lighted window on the second floor, sort of like the cover of a Gothic romance. All it needed was Elspeth in a flowing white nightgown running through the yard, terror etched on her face.
Yvonne’s house was much smaller, a little 1950s crackerbox in a neighborhood of others. Vinyl siding, a flat facade, and a little carport off to one side with a small, white Nissan parked underneath. I slowed down. There was no sign of Rafe’s black Harley-Davidson anywhere. Yvonne’s lights were on, though, and with the windows rolled down, I could hear loud music, or maybe the television.
I hesitated, my foot on the brake. Should I drive past, or should I actually stop and get out and sneak up to one of the windows to see if Yvonne was alone? Was it enough that I didn’t see Rafe’s bike, or did I want to make extra-sure he really wasn’t here? Was it possible that he might have parked somewhere out of sight, so no one would know he was visiting, and that’s why I couldn’t see the Harley?
Would he bother to stay out of sight, when everyone knew Yvonne’s reputation? Or was it his own he’d be protecting?
I made a slow circuit around the block just to make sure he hadn’t parked nearby. There was no sign of the bike. No sign of any other cars, either, other than the ones parked in the driveways. Rafe sometimes drives a black Town Car that he borrows from his buddy Wendell. I didn’t see that, either. Going past Elspeth’s house a second time, I noticed the tail end of a light-colored car parked behind her house. Another white Toyota or Honda; there sure were a lot of those around. The light was still on in the upstairs window. Elspeth’s bedroom, most likely. Maybe she was reading.
But at least Rafe wasn’t there. He’d told me, in no uncertain terms, that he’d steered clear of Elspeth after that initial misguided occasion when he slept with her. She’d been hounding him forever—some need to save him from himself, Rafe thought, or maybe the preacher’s daughter just wanted to walk on the wild side—and she continued to pursue him after the fact. I wondered, not for the first time, whether she really had gotten pregnant and had an abortion afterwards, like Todd had suggested. Or merely a nervous breakdown at the thought of never seeing him again.
Yvonne’s house looked the same when I came back. Lights on, TV blaring, car in the driveway, no sign of Rafe’s bike. I pulled the Volvo to a stop on the corner and got out. Looked around. Everything was quiet. Nobody else was out and about, and no one was looking at me through their windows. I started down the sidewalk, my heels clicking softly on the pavement.
Yes, I was still wearing my skirt and blouse and high heels from the funeral. Way to go, Savannah; go sneaking through someone’s yard in Italian leather slingbacks!
Then again, the heels were pretty well shot already, from walking around the graveyard in them earlier. I wasn’t too worried.
Yvonne’s house was low to the ground, but not so low that I could see through the front windows. When I got to the backyard, though, the ground was a little higher, and I could see inside. The kitchen window was shorter than the rest, and too high, but I could see into the back bedrooms. There were two: one was pristine and clearly unoccupied, with the bed neatly made and the chair in the corner pristine with a needlepoint pillow.
The other bedroom was a different story. There, the big bed was unmade, and there were clothes on practically every surface, including the floor. Yvonne’s work uniform from earlier was lying in a pile on the carpet next to the black hightop sneakers she’d had on at the funeral. There was a bra hanging from the drawer pull on the bureau—it was black and lacy—and piles of discarded clothes everywhere. The top of the bureau was littered with earrings and bracelets, hairbrushes and combs, cough drops, rubber bands, and all the other items a woman keeps in her bedroom. There was no sign of Rafe.
Yvonne was in the living room; I caught just a glimpse of her profile through the doorway. She was curled up on the sofa, a bowl of popcorn in her lap, and she was laughing, probably at the TV. There were fuzzy slippers on her feet, and she was dressed in sweats and a T-shirt, so I thought it safe to assume that she was alone. If Rafe had been here, or been expected, she’d either be stark naked or severely dolled up.
I got back in the car and turned the Volvo back toward Sweetwater.
Chapter Seventeen
From where I was, the Bog was a thirty minute drive. I had to go back down the Pulaski Highway to Sweetwater, then through Sweetwater and out on the south side. I spent the time talking to myself about what I was doing and why.
The last time I drove through the night, from Sweetwater to Nashville after Todd’s proposal, I hadn’t realized, consciously, where I was going until I found myself outside the house on Potsdam Street. This time I had no illusions about that. I’d gone to Yvonne’s house to see if Rafe was there. Now that I knew he wasn’t, I was on my way to see him.
Not to sleep with him. That was a complication I didn’t need again. Not when the first time was still playing on a continuous loop in my head. I just wanted to see him. Talk to him. Make sure he was OK. After all, he was all alone in the Bog, in a trailer that didn’t even have electricity or running water anymore...
I almost missed the turnoff in the dark, and had to stand on the brakes and then reverse a few yards before I could turn the nose of the Volvo down the track that led to the cluster of trailers and shacks. I parked in the open space between the houses and looked around. Just like every other time I’d been here, there was no sign of life. And pitch black, once I’d turned the headlights off. Eerily so. There were no street lights down here
, no moon tonight, and no lights in any of the trailers. Nor surprisingly, since no one lived here.
The Collier trailer was also dark, and my heart was beating hard as I closed the car door and picked my way across the rutted ground, around the corner to the carport and the back door. There was no sign of the Harley-Davidson, and also no answer when I knocked. I waited a minute, my breath stuttering the whole time, and knocked again. The skin at the back of my neck crawled; I felt like the dark was full of staring eyes, and I braced myself for the door to open like last time, and for Rafe to yank me inside.
He didn’t. The door didn’t open, and nothing else happened, either. I tried the knob. The place was locked.
So Rafe wasn’t with Yvonne, but obviously he wasn’t here either. Maybe he’d changed his mind and decided to head back to Nashville after the funeral. Maybe the thought of staying in this God-forsaken place where he’d grown up, had been too much to bear.
Or maybe I’d missed him somewhere along the way and he was rolling around in Yvonne’s bed right now.
There was nothing for it but to leave. And although I was tempted to drive all the way back through Sweetwater to Damascus again, for one last check, I didn’t. It was just too pathetic. Instead, I drove home, where Mother was thrilled that I was back safely, and happy to turn the conversation away from both Satterfields and our relationships with them.
* * *
When I came down to the kitchen the next morning, Mother looked surprised. “You’re up early. Are you driving back to Nashville already?”
“I was thinking of going out for breakfast,” I explained. “To Beulah’s. You’re welcome to come if you’d like.” Please say no.
“Beulah’s?” Mother wrinkled her aristocratic nose. “I don’t think so, darling. I have an appointment with your Aunt Regina later this morning, to discuss the Sweetwater Christmas Tour of Homes. And Beulah’s food is rather heavy, don’t you find?”
“I guess.” I wasn’t going for the food, so I didn’t care. “I’m not sure I’ll be going back to Nashville today. I wouldn’t mind going to see Aunt Regina with you. Maybe talk about advertising in the home tour brochure, or something. I have to come up with a way to get some clients. And make some money.”
“If you remarried...” Mother said and thought better of continuing.
“I like what I do. And I’d like to be successful at it. Aunt Regina is good at writing newspaper copy. Audrey is good at running the boutique. You’ve built the Martin mansion into an events venue. Catherine is a lawyer. I’d like to have a career, too. One I enjoy and I’m good at.”
“Sheila doesn’t have a career,” Mother pointed out.
“She seems happy taking care of Dix and the kids, though. Doesn’t she?” I rarely see Sheila, other than Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, the fourth of July, and birthdays. Maybe a dozen times a year.
“Wouldn’t you be happy taking care of a husband and children?”
“I guess that would depend on who the husband was.”
The words fell out of my mouth before I realized I had had the thought. Mother looked shocked, and I added, “I know you brought me up to be a good wife and a good mother and all those things. But these days, women like to have careers outside the home, too. I’m not ready to stay home and take care of a man. I tried it with Bradley, and it didn’t work.”
“If you had had children...”
“I’m not sure that would have made a difference. If the marriage is rocky, adding kids to the mix will probably just make it worse.”
I’d realized that when Bradley and I broke up. And then I’d been grateful that my one and only pregnancy had ended in a miscarriage. “I’m going to run. When are you meeting Aunt Regina?”
Mother said she and my aunt were meeting at eleven, for an early lunch at the café on the square. “You’re not planning to spend three hours at Beulah’s, are you, darling?”
“Of course not,” I said. “I’m just having breakfast. And touching base with an old friend who works there.”
“One of your old friends works at Beulah’s?”
“She’s more of an old acquaintance. Someone I went to school with. I saw her at Marquita’s funeral yesterday, and thought I’d go to Beulah’s for breakfast this morning.”
“Ah.” Mother’s face cleared. “Well, be careful, darling. A lot of riff-raff goes to Beulah’s.”
“I’ve been there before. And it’s broad daylight. I’m sure I’ll be safe.” I ducked out the door and hustled down the hallway.
Fifteen minutes later I pulled the Volvo into the parking lot outside Beulah’s Meat’n Three, and had to wait for someone in a rusty pickup with a gun rack to pull out before I could slot my car in. Picking my way across the graveled lot, treacherous for someone on three inch heels, I tried to compose my face and my thoughts so I wouldn’t grab Yvonne by the lapels when I saw her and scream at her to tell me whether she’d spent last night alone.
Beulah’s was buzzing. Filled to the brim; there were people at all the tables and ranged around the breakfast counter. Two waitresses were threading their way between the tables, trays with coffee pots and water pitchers held above their heads. Neither of them was Yvonne. Nor was she the waitress behind the counter, taking care of the eight or nine men perched there.
“We’re full up, hon,” she called out when she saw me. “It’ll be a few minutes before we can seat you.”
I nodded. I thought about asking if Yvonne was anywhere about, but she’d already turned away to fill someone’s coffee cup. Instead, I looked around the restaurant. And felt my stomach clench when my eyes reached the table in the far back, the one I’d sat at last time I was here.
Rafe was sitting there. With his back to the wall, so he could keep an eye on everyone in the place. He’d seen me as soon as I walked in, of course. He’d probably seen me cross the parking lot, too.
He was alone, at a table for two. Maybe he was having breakfast with Yvonne, and she was in the bathroom or something. I hesitated.
He arched his brows, watching me dither, and the expression in his eyes was somewhere between amusement and malice, with a little challenge thrown in for good measure.
I suppressed a sigh. Talk about being caught between the rock and the hard place. There were people here I knew, or at least people who knew me. People who were familiar with Rafe, as well. The fact that Margaret Anne Martin’s perfect youngest daughter sat down to breakfast with LaDonna Collier’s good-for-nothing son, would raise some eyebrows and set tongues a-wagging in Sweetwater.
On the other hand, pretending I didn’t know him would hurt his feelings. And it would make me feel ashamed of myself.
I took a deep breath and headed for the back of the restaurant, my head held high, nodding and smiling politely left and right to people I recognized. They followed my progress out of the corners of their eyes, in some cases with undisguised curiosity.
I stopped in front of Rafe, my heart beating hard. “Good morning.”
He smiled. “Morning, darlin’.” The greeting was accompanied by a leisurely once-over, from the top of my head to the bottom of my skirt and back.
“I didn’t expect to see you here,” I said, making sure my voice carried to at least the tables closest to us. Bad enough that they saw me talking to him; at least they should know we hadn’t planned to meet.
“I told you I’d be spending the night.”
“I know you did. But last night...” I bit my tongue, just before blurting out that when I’d gone looking for him, he hadn’t been where he said he’d be. He knew what I didn’t say, though; I could read it in his eyes. They narrowed with amusement. When he didn’t comment, I could have kissed him. At least if we’d been somewhere else.
“Have a seat.” He pushed the chair on the opposite side of the table a few inches with his foot.
“You don’t have company?” I pulled it the rest of the way out and sank down.
He quirked a brow. “Who’d I be eating with, darlin’?”
“I thought maybe... Yvonne?”
He shook his head. “She ain’t here.”
“Did you come to see her?”
“I just came to eat.” He glanced around the room and back at me. “Lots of people looking at us.”
I folded my hands in my lap, demurely. “This’ll be all over town by suppertime.”
His eyes met mine across the table. They were serious. “You OK with that?”
“I’m sitting here, aren’t I?”
He smiled. “Bet your mama ain’t gonna be happy when it gets back to her, though.” He paused a second before he added, thoughtfully, “Or Satterfield.”
Oops. The thought of Todd hadn’t even crossed my mind. And he’d have an absolute fit when he heard. “I’m not doing anything wrong.”
“Didn’t say you were, darlin’.” Rafe leaned back against the wall, hands folded across his stomach. He was wearing a short-sleeved black T-shirt today, tight across the chest and shoulders, with that viper winking at me from under the sleeve. “So what are you doing here? This place ain’t exactly Fidelio’s.”
“Same as you. Just looking for breakfast,” I said.
“Uh-huh.”
I grimaced. “Fine. I was hoping to see Yvonne.”
The amusement was back in his eyes. No malice this time. “Checking up on me, darlin’?”
“Why would I be doing that?”
“Can’t imagine,” Rafe said, grinning. After a moment he added, “You’re outta luck, though. Yvonne’s not here this morning.” He raised his voice, snagging the waitress’s attention, “Hey, darlin’. Savannah here’s looking for Yvonne McCoy. She coming in later?”
The waitress, a bubble-gum popping fifty-year-old with a beehive, someone who’d been working at Beulah’s since I was a little girl, stopped beside our table. “Yvonne’s supposed to be here right now. Didn’t show up this morning. That’s why we’re running around like chickens with our heads cut off.” She glanced over her shoulder as someone else tried to get her attention, and held up a finger. “What can I get for you, hon?”
[Cutthroat Business 01.0 - 03.0] Boxed Set Page 74