Crazy for Love

by Victoria Dahl

  One way or another, she’d get through this.

  Space was made for her and her parents in one of the middle rows, and almost immediately after they sat, the bailiff quieted the court and the hearing began.

  She’d expected something dramatic, but the lawyers got into the mechanics of the case in calm, deliberate voices. While they droned on, Chloe stared at the back of Thomas’s head. She knew that hairline. The closely cropped dark blond hair. The shaved nape that got prickly when he needed a trim. He’d loved it when Chloe would pet him there, or he’d pretended to, anyway. Her memories were no longer trustworthy. They were more like Russian dolls, the real meanings nested beneath layers of interior shells.

  He might have really loved her at some point. Or perhaps he was gay and she’d been a beard. Or maybe he’d wanted her for her awesomely cool postal delivery truck.

  A woman leaned forward to whisper in Thomas’s ear. His mother.

  Maybe his mother had been behind the whole thing. She’d desperately wanted grandchildren. What if she’d only wanted Chloe for her womb, and once she’d had her grandchild, Mrs. DeLorn had planned to chop Chloe up and raise the child as her own? Thomas’s flight may have been an idiotic attempt to save Chloe’s life.

  But probably not.

  While Chloe glared at the back of Mrs. DeLorn’s head, the woman glanced back as if she could feel the heat. Her gaze was distant and worried, though, and didn’t pick Chloe out of the crowd. She whispered again to Thomas, and he shook his head.

  Even if Mrs. DeLorn hadn’t planned to murder Chloe and steal her own grandchild, the woman was up to something. What the hell could it be?

  The lawyers all approached the judge’s bench for a hushed conversation. Finally, the D.A. was invited to declare the charges.

  The quiet room slipped into complete silence. And then the D.A. dropped his bomb.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  MAX HAD ARRIVED TOO LATE. He hadn’t decided to return to Richmond until the morning. D.C. traffic had been hell, and now he was late and Chloe was in there alone. Well, not alone exactly.

  He’d heard from the news reports being filed around him that Chloe Turner had entered the courtroom at 8:45 a.m., flanked by her parents. Max had arrived at 8:59 a.m. and hadn’t been allowed access to the courthouse at all. Now he stood with the rest of the crowd, neck craned and eyes fixed on the front doors, waiting for any hint of what was going on inside. There were no cameras allowed in the hearing. Justice was blind and so was the press for now.

  Shifting from foot to foot, Max waited impatiently for the news. He’d been an ass, and Chloe might never forgive him, but he wanted to be here to offer support, even if she didn’t accept it. When he shifted restlessly, Max caught sight of wavy blond hair caught back in a headband, and tilted his head a little farther to the left. When the woman raised her thumb to her mouth to chew the nail, Max recognized the gesture. That was Jenn on the top steps of the courthouse.

  He didn’t know whether to feel relief or anger or sympathy for her, but then there was no time to think of Jenn at all. Figures shifted behind the glass, and then a man came running out, holding a notebook high. “I’ve got it!”

  The crowd shushed itself, and everyone held their breath.

  Two counts of fraud.

  Three counts of forgery.

  And…seven counts of felony embezzlement. Embezzlement?

  There was no reverent pause. The crowd didn’t draw in a collective breath. The man’s notebook tilted and he looked up as if he were done, and that was the signal for a frantic explosion of sound and movement. Little teams moved into blank corners of the sidewalk to fire up the cameras and read the indictment again. Others rushed up the stairs, eager to make contact with someone who could explain this strange turn of events.

  Max just stood there, dumbfounded. Embezzlement. And Jenn was an accountant. Had she helped him with that? He looked for her again, but everyone had shifted and he couldn’t pick her out.

  He paced forward and back, waiting. A woman spoke to his right, a camera held close to her mouth as she tried to calmly recite the exciting news. Max recognized her. She’d introduced Chloe’s infamous video this morning, then reported the things Max had said to that reporter, all of them twisted so that they became a more delicious treat for the masses.

  Rage surged through him, as strong as the horror he’d felt when he’d read the first “details” of his conversation with the reporter. How the hell did he end up hurting Chloe when he was trying to help? If this was what it was like to live as a nonneurotic person, maybe he wasn’t cut out for it. It was dangerous, and people got hurt. Chloe got hurt.

  A man rushed past him, signaling to the woman that he had more news, and then all four doors at the top of the stairs flew open and people began to come down.

  The reporters cut their feed off just that quickly and a tide of bodies pushed forward to meet the wave of people coming down. Max braced himself, trying to spot Chloe. If he looked away, she might be swallowed up and swept away from him.

  Hints of gossip drifted past him. Embezzlement. Fifty thousand dollars. There was a woman. A federal grand jury was being convened. But he couldn’t follow any of the hints to their conclusion, because his only goal was reaching Chloe.

  A podium appeared and the lawyers descended like royalty. And there, in the midst of them, was the guy Max recognized from the gossip sites. Thomas DeLorn. The man who’d betrayed Chloe in the worst way possible. Max watched him for a moment as the press screamed around him. What kind of a stupid ass hole would’ve tried to escape from Chloe Turner?

  Max blinked. What kind of a stupid asshole was Max?

  Finally, he spotted her, too pale but still pretty enough to make his heart lurch. She paused at the top step, a frown creasing her brow as she hesitated, clearly confused by something. An older couple stood behind her, obviously her parents, and they looked confused, as well. As the trio bypassed the crowd in the middle of the stairs and sneaked down at the very edge, Max realized what had struck them as odd. No one was following them. The press didn’t turn their way. The laser-sharp paparazzi beam was aimed squarely at Thomas DeLorn now. Chloe’s part in the media-stoked drama was done.

  Max rushed across the sidewalk to the side of the stairs where Chloe would end up, but then he saw that she had been stopped after all. Not by a reporter, but by Jenn.

  Everything inside him was urging him to get to her now. To pull her into his arms and apologize and kiss her senseless. But that wasn’t what was going to happen. Not in front of her parents, certainly. And probably not even if they were all alone.

  He’d left when he should’ve stayed. In the frantic pressure of that moment, he’d made the wrong choice. Or maybe this was just what it felt like to make a tough decision. To walk away from a responsibility that wasn’t really his.

  Max made his feet stay still instead of racing up to her. He’d come to warn her about Jenn, but it was way too late for that. He’d walked away and he could never take that back.

  CHLOE MOVED STIFFLY DOWN the steps, uncomfortably aware of Jenn at her back. Jenn wanted to talk, so she was going to drive Chloe home, as if she needed the support now.

  But she was ready for the truth, and when her foot hit the sidewalk, she walked briskly toward the parking lot. Only to be stopped dead in her tracks by the sight of him. Max. Turning away from her as if he were about to leave.

  When he glanced back and spotted her, he stood straight in surprise, lips parting as if he were about to speak.

  His eyes slid to a spot over her shoulder, then back to her, a question etched over his brow. Chloe glanced back and saw her parents waiting behind her. Her dad was frowning at Jenn, but her mom aimed her glare straight at Max.

  Well, this was going to be awkward. Then again, her mind was spinning too fast to worry about awkwardness, so perhaps this was a good time. She tipped her chin in a nod, and Max closed the distance between them.

  “Leaving again?” she asked, realiz
ing it was a bitchy thing to say, even as the words left her lips.

  He flushed, but met her gaze straight on. “Yes.”

  “All right then.”

  “But I need to apologize. About the reporter.”

  “Hey, I’m used to it.”

  “No, listen. Please. That wasn’t what I said. I mean it. I’d never, ever do that to you. They took my words out of context.”

  Hope bloomed in her chest, and she moved quickly to smother it. “You said you couldn’t help me if you wanted to.”

  “I said you were great. I said you were fine the way you were. That’s why I couldn’t help you. They left that part out, Chloe, I swear.”

  She looked at him, standing there a few inches from her personal space, hands open at his sides, as if he didn’t know whether to touch her or not. The hope refused to be smothered. It could be true. How many times had the press twisted her words? How many times had they made up outright lies?

  “Max…”

  He stepped closer, his voice dropping. “I would never, ever do that to you, Chloe. I swear, I’d never hurt you on purpose. You have to believe that.”

  Did she? Looking up into his pained eyes, she did believe him. Yes, she’d hurt him the day before, but he’d been trying to do the right thing. Max would always try to do the right thing.

  “I believe you,” she whispered, and his face showed the same lurch from agony to hope that she felt inside her chest.

  Behind her, her mom cleared her throat, and Max’s gaze flickered in that direction. He looked back at her with a question in his eyes. A horrible time to introduce the parents, but her life was one big jumble of weirdness at the moment. He could deal with it or leave.

  “Max, these are my parents, Beth Turner and Jimmy Turner. Mom and Dad, this is Max Sullivan.”

  Max took the hand her father offered. “Mr. and Mrs. Turner,” he said like a nice Southern boy.

  When her mom folded her hands together, clearly not offering one to Max, he looked down at the ground. “I apologize for anything you might have seen about me on the news. I swear I only want good things for Chloe. My words were twisted around.”

  Her mom acknowledged the apology with only a raised eyebrow before she turned to Chloe. “All right, sweetie. You give us a call later. I’m going to get your dad out into his garden before he has a stroke.”

  A muttered argument about who was in better shape trailed behind them as they walked away. Chloe accidentally met Jenn’s red-rimmed eyes and spun back toward Max in response.

  “I told you not to hang around.”

  “I didn’t. I went back to D.C.”

  Ouch. That hurt.

  His eyes focused on Jenn for a split second. “I was worried, but I know you can take care of yourself. I know that, Chloe. I didn’t mean to imply… But then this morning, when I heard the interview, I had to come. I couldn’t let you think I would say that.”

  “Okay.”

  “Look…” He finally touched her, his fingers sending shivers from her elbow all the way to her knees. “Can we talk somewhere?”

  She wanted to say yes. Wanted to tuck her hand around his arm and walk away from Jenn and her tortured eyes. If Max was back to take care of her, in that split second of vulnerability, she wanted him to whisk her away.

  But she was strong. She was.

  “Come by my place in a little while?”

  His whole body softened and his mouth curved into a brief, brilliant smile before he pressed it back into seriousness.

  “Yes. Absolutely. Half an hour?”

  She now had the perfect excuse to keep her conversation with Jenn to a minimum. “Yes. Perfect.”

  Max kissed her cheek, the scent of him hurting her heart, and then she was alone with Jenn Castellan, the friend she’d loved more than any boy. More than even a sister.

  Jenn led her to her car, and before she could start the engine, Chloe said, “Tell me.”

  Jenn’s hands closed over the steering wheel. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Just tell me.”

  “I know what you think, but it wasn’t me. I’d never do that to you. Never.”

  That snapped her out of her bitter fugue. “Then who?” she asked even as she realized that she knew.

  “Anna,” Jenn said.

  “Oh, my God.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “But…they hardly know each other. They’ve only met a few times. And you’ve been acting so weird. Why have you been acting so weird?”

  Jenn took a shuddering breath and wiped her eyes. “I knew about it, and I didn’t tell you. And then I knew if you ever found out, you’d hate me, too. Maybe even more.”

  “Anna told you?”

  “No,” Jenn whispered.

  “Then how could you know?”

  “I saw them together. At Anna’s apartment. I went by to bring her a few books she wanted to read and she was walking him out.”

  “Wait a minute, you’re talking about after the plane crash, right?”

  Even before Jenn shook her head, Chloe finally understood why her friend had been so upset for all these weeks. “How long?” she managed to get out past her tight throat. “How long have you known that one of my friends was sleeping with my fiancé?”

  “I saw them together three months ago. I’m so sorry, Chloe. I didn’t know what to do, but Anna promised me it had only happened that one time and she’d cut it off right away. I thought she had, I swear.”

  “And you thought that was okay? As long as it didn’t happen again?”

  “No, but I thought hurting you wouldn’t serve any purpose!”

  “Jenn. Jesus Christ, would you just listen to yourself? I was going to marry him. You were going to let me marry him.”

  “My mom was always—”

  “Damn it, it’s time for you to grow up. You’re not your mom, and I’m definitely not your mom. Oh, and—news flash, Jenn—not every man is like your dad, either, so get over it.”

  Jenn smothered a sob, and Chloe closed her eyes against the guilt. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  “No, you’re right. I’m a coward. I was afraid to hurt you, so I lied. And then it got worse and worse.”

  “The crash.”

  “I swear I thought it was over between them, Chloe!”

  All the tension she’d felt over the past week seemed to coalesce in her shoulders at that moment. She tried twisting her neck, but nothing popped. “Maybe you’d better start driving. I have to be back at my place to meet Max.”

  Jenn didn’t try to protest or defend herself, but Chloe didn’t feel any satisfaction. She could be mean to Jenn for that very reason. It was safe to be mean to someone who wouldn’t fight back. But she was so angry, bubbling over with it, and she had to get it out.

  “I gather it wasn’t over?” she snapped as they pulled out of the lot and headed away from the courthouse. Not one reporter even looked in their direction. It felt strange, like stepping out of a dark theater in the middle of the day. Disorienting to be set free into the bright, beautiful sunlight.

  “When the plane crashed,” Jenn said, her voice raspy with tears, “I was so glad I hadn’t told you. I thought ‘It’s over. She never needs to know.’”

  “You’re saying you were relieved. That he was dead.”

  “No! Or maybe I was! I didn’t want you to marry him anymore, obviously, but I didn’t know how to stop the wedding without hurting you.”

  “That’s so fucking stupid, Jenn! You were going to sentence me to a lifetime with a man who was lying and cheating before we even got married.”

  “I know. As soon as they found Thomas in Florida, Anna called me. She was completely freaked out and panicking. I told her not to tell anyone. Not you, not the police.”

  Chloe’s jaw felt too tight to move, but she managed to whisper, “Tell them what?”

  For a long moment, Jenn didn’t speak. Her careful breathing betrayed an attempt to control tears. Finally, she nodded to herself and took o
ne last breath. “She said they both felt trapped in their lives. Anna in her family’s business and Thomas in his. They talked about running away, but Anna said that was just part of a fantasy. She didn’t really think he’d put it in motion.”

  “So they were in love.”

  “I guess they thought they were. But Anna said she realized how sick it was, and she sent him a letter. She told Thomas it was wrong and she didn’t want to live like that. She said they could either build a life together or he could marry you, but he couldn’t have you both.”

  “Wow. She was…she was going to steal him from me.”

  “She thought he’d stay with you. She was trying to end it.”

  “Well, that certainly didn’t work out very well!”

  “I guess he thought she was telling him she was ready to run away. When he called her…she couldn’t believe it.”

  Chloe stared out the windshield, stunned by the story. If this were a soap opera, she’d be the villain, the cold fiancée keeping Thomas from his true love.

  “Chloe.” Jenn reached for her hand, but when Chloe instinctively drew away, Jenn put her hand back on the steering wheel. Beautiful houses slipped past the windows, white paint glowing in the cheerful morning light. Meanwhile, Chloe was driving through her own personal hurricane.

  “He fell in love with someone else and I didn’t even notice.”

  “Anna thinks it was more about running away from his mother than it was about her.”

  “Well, I’m happy Anna has such great insight into my fiancé. Did she help him embezzle money? Did she steal money from her father?”

  “I don’t know. She’s cooperating with the district attorney. We didn’t talk about that.”

  Chloe swallowed hard. She stared ahead, not seeing the road. Instead, she saw the DeLorn Limited phone numbers flashing to life on her phone. “His mother,” she breathed. “What?”

  “He stole that money from his mother. That’s what the embezzlement charges are.”