by JB Lynn
He nodded, offering silent encouragement to continue with my story.
“And then he shoved me into the wall.” My hands curled into fists at the memory. “I just got so mad. I followed him into the room to tell him off.”
The detective pulled a roll of wintergreen Lifesavers from his shirt pocket and offered me one.
I could smell the minty-fresh flavor from across the table. In my hungover state it made me want to retch. “No, thank you.”
“So . . . you went in the room to tell him off, and . . .”
“He had a pillow over Dominic’s face.”
“You knew the boy’s name?” He popped the mint into his mouth and chewed, slowly and deliberately.
“Not then.” Apparently he didn’t understand that the point of the candy was to allow it to dissolve on one’s tongue. The relentless crunching grated on my nerves.
“But you found out later?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
I hesitated for a second. It probably wasn’t a good idea to mention Tony/Anthony Delveccio. That was a can of worms better left unopened. “Someone told me.”
“Who?”
“I really don’t remember. There were so many doctors, nurses, and other hospital staff milling around.”
“Family?”
I considered playing dumb, but decided that was too far-fetched, and I’d end up getting caught in the lie. “Yes, of course! I probably heard some family members use Dominic’s name.”
“Probably. So you see the pillow and then what?”
“I hit him with a chair. Twice. But then he got it away from me and . . .” My voice cracked as I remembered my terror in that moment.
“Take your time.”
“He swung it at me.”
“And he missed?”
I nodded emphatically. He’d most definitely missed.
“That’s the part I don’t get. Alfonso Cifelli is a bad guy. He’s got multiple assault-and-battery arrests on his record, but you, who, as far as I can tell, have no special hand-to-hand combat training, managed to beat him.” His soft voice was now laced with tempered steel.
“No, no! I didn’t beat him. I avoided him.”
“How?”
I looked away. I couldn’t believe that I was about to admit my stealthy ninja move to this man. I blurted out my confession as one long word. “Istoppeddroppedandrolled.”
“You what?
I sighed. “I stopped. I dropped. And I rolled. He was swinging that chair at me. It was the only thing I could think to do. Fire avoidance 101.”
The corners of his mouth quirked, but he had the good grace not to actually laugh at me. “Like they teach to kindergartners?” The edge in his voice was gone. Now he just sounded amused.
“Exactly!”
“I never understood why they drill that into five-year-olds who will probably never get near an open flame, but they don’t even mention it to adolescents when they give them Bunsen burners in junior-high chemistry classes.”
I grinned. “I never thought of it that way.”
“Maybe they’re afraid that having boys and girls rolling around on the floor together would necessitate additional sex-ed classes.”
For a split second I thought there was a spark of sexual tension hovering in the air. Yeah, I was so lonely that the mere mention of the word sex in conversation had me misreading signals.
He grinned and continued, “Or maybe they’ve just figured out that people don’t retain much after the age of ten.”
The guy was certainly not hitting on me.
Embarrassed by my desperateness, I managed a weak smirk. “Or in my case, five.”
“That was a very brave thing you did, Miss Lee. Dumb, but brave. Thank you for your time.”
He got up and left me sitting alone at the picnic bench. He was right about one thing.
I was dumb.
Chapter Nine
YOU KNOW IT isn’t good news when a social worker shows up at your door looking depressed yet determined. I have, due to a lifetime of experience dealing with social workers, determined that only those freshly out of school and in their first placement wear an I’m ready to change the world expression. The rest—underpaid, overworked, and drowning in red tape—look like the woman who stood in the doorway of Katie’s hospital room.
I appreciated that she allowed me to finish reading Where the Wild Things Are before she cleared her throat. Content in the knowledge that Max had made it home to sleep in his own bed, I joined the woman in the hallway.
She clutched the clipboard she held as though it were a shield that wielded magical bureaucratical protection. “I’m sorry to interrupt your visit with your niece, Miss Lee. I’m Stacy Kiernan, the hospital’s patient liaison.”
She stuck out her hand.
I wondered whether she’d remembered we’d met before. Twice over the past couple of days in fact.
I shook her hand. Just like the other two times, it was warm and firm. She made sure to make eye contact. I’m guessing that’s Social Worker 101—make a connection, create a rapport.
“We’ve met before, Ms. Kiernan.”
“Oh good, you remember that.”
“Yup.” I’d lost my mind, not my memory.
“Some people don’t. For some, all this,” she waved her arms as though encompassing the entire building, “is too much.”
“Uh huh.”
“Perhaps we could sit down?” Without waiting for a response, she hurried toward a “guest” area at the end of the hall. The whole place was littered with impromptu waiting spots, clusters of two or three chairs tossed into every available corner. Since patients were only allowed two visitors at a time, family members spent shifts rotating from bedside to “guest” areas in a macabre game of musical chairs.
When we were both settled in chairs facing one another, Stacy Kiernan slid the glasses on top of her head down onto her nose. She looked down at her clipboard, making a show of reading the papers attached to it.
She didn’t fool me for a second. I knew that she was stalling for time, putting off the inevitable. She was the bearer of bad news.
I didn’t know exactly what the bad news was, but I was ready for it. I had been since the moment I’d seen her standing in Katie’s doorway.
I wanted to tell her that it was okay. I wished I could tell her to just spit it out. I wasn’t going to collapse, or cry, or freak out. I’ve heard it all before: Your father’s been arrested for murder. Your mother needs help. Darlene’s body has been found. Marlene’s left a note, she’s run away. There’s been an accident. Katie’s in a coma. I’m as accustomed to receiving bad news as some ridiculously lucky people are to yell “BINGO!” on a weekly basis.
I couldn’t tell her all that, though. I would have sounded crazy. So instead I just waited, watching as she adjusted her glasses. She and Katie were currently in a dead heat when it came to scintillating conversation.
Finally, unable to bear the uncomfortable silence for another second longer, I blurted, “You’re kicking her to the curb, aren’t you?”
Stacy Kiernan reared back as though the very idea was offensive, as though she’d never considered doing such a thing, like that wasn’t the exact reason we were sitting there.
“I . . . I. . . .” she stuttered.
I literally had to sit on my hands to keep from saluting her and saying, “Aye, aye, Captain!” Instead I fixed an expectant stare on her.
She couldn’t meet my eyes. “Well, I would . . . I wouldn’t have . . . I’m sorry, but the insurance . . .”
She seemed incapable of stringing a complete sentence together.
I took pity on the unfortunate woman. It must really suck to have to tell people their loved ones are getting booted from the best care facility because of astronomical medical bills. “It’s okay. Can I get you a cup of water or something?”
Her gaze skittered in my direction. Poor thing was still waiting for me to blow up at her.
“It’s not your fault. You’re just doing your job.”
The clipboard slipped from her fingers, crashing to the floor. She made no move to pick it up, because she was sobbing.
She wasn’t teary, or sniffling, or crying. No, she was sobbing. Body-shaking, gut-wrenching, soul-cleansing sobs.
For a brief moment I envied her liberal expression of pain.
People up and down the hallway cast furtive glances in our direction. I fought the urge to shout that I was the one who should be crying. I was the wronged party here. I deserved their pity and sympathy, dammit!
I was embarrassed for Stacy Kiernan. After all, this was her place of employment. At the same time it angered me. More than was called for. More than I liked. Her unrestrained crying jag reminded me too much of my mother’s emotional outbursts.
I yearned to slap some sense into her like they used to do to hysterical women in black-and-white movies, but that was socially unacceptable. Instead, I put a hand on her shoulder and murmured, “It’s okay. Everything is going to be okay.”
It never fails to amaze me the way that simple little lie delivers so much comfort. It did its job. Her sobs quickly petered out into occasional hiccups as she confided that she’d had a terrible week.
I somehow managed not to tell her that she had no idea what a terrible week was until she’d lived my life. I listened to her complain that her coworkers were mean, her mother demanding, and her ex-boyfriend needy. Then she told me that I was the nicest, most understanding person she’d talked to all week.
I ended up listening to her litany of woes for more than an hour. When she was finally done, I’d made a new friend.
A friend who told me that if I couldn’t come up with a lot of money pretty quickly, Katie would be transferred out of this premiere treatment center to a state-run hospital.
“How much will that hurt her chances of recovery?” I asked my new friend.
Stacy, her face still blotchy from crying, shook her head. “I’m not a medical doctor.”
“Ballpark it for me.”
She glanced around to make sure no one else was within earshot. “They earn the big bucks here for a reason. These guys are the best. They may be obnoxious. They may have God complexes. But they work miracles. I’ve seen it. If I were you I’d do whatever it takes to keep her here. If there was a way to sell your soul to the devil for cash, I’d take the deal.”
At that moment Tony/Anthony Delveccio strolled past. The devil himself didn’t even look in our direction.
I knew with a certainty that chilled me to my bones that I had to take him up on his job offer.
I WAS JUST ABOUT to stroll into Dominic’s room to tell Tony/Anthony Delveccio that I was willing to kill his son-in-law when someone tapped me on the shoulder.
Fervently hoping it wasn’t poor Stacy Kiernan coming back to unload more of her angst, I slowly turned around. I was shocked to see a familiar, statuesque blonde, who could pass for Heidi Klum’s sister, staring at me with tears in her eyes.
I wondered for a moment if this was another delusion, like believing I could talk to a lizard. Was I just imagining that my oldest and best friend, the only person who’d never let me down, all through my mom’s craziness, my dad’s incarceration, Darlene’s death, and Marlene’s running away, was actually standing in front of me?
“You look like hell, Maggie.”
Throwing my arms around her, I said (and actually meant), “Alice! It’s so good to see you!”
With her genuinely sweet disposition and easy laugh, Alice is one of those people who brightens every room she steps into. I’d desperately missed her light during these dark days. Not to mention how much I missed her unwavering support.
“Oh, Maggie. I’m so sorry. So sorry about Theresa and Katie. I’m sorry I wasn’t here for you. How’s your dad holding up?”
I tensed, mid-hug. Alice and I were best friends, but there are two things we always argue about: her abysmal taste in men and the fact that she adores my father. Ever since he’d stopped her own dad from molesting her by beating the crap out of him and running him out of town, she’d worshipped him.
“He does know, doesn’t he?” she asked.
“I told him.”
“Good. That was the right thing to do. I’m proud of you, Maggie.”
I took a step back so that I could see her properly. Besides being ridiculously good-looking, my dear friend Alice was an amazing humanitarian who traveled to exotic spots all over the world to teach English . . . or is it irrigation? Either way, she enriches lives, while I, on the other hand, ask people if the police had given them a ticket when they crashed their vehicle. “What are you doing here? You’re supposed to be gone for another three months.”
She patted her stomach.
“You’re sick? You picked up one of those exotic nasty bugs or worms, like they’re always trying to diagnose on House, didn’t you?”
She shook her head.
“Then what? Your iron stomach finally surrendered and you couldn’t take the local diet?”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Delveccio amble out of his grandson’s room. Dammit! I needed to talk to him, but I couldn’t very well do that while chatting with Alice.
She shook her head again. An angelic smile spread across her face, making her eyes sparkle and her skin glow.
I was still too slow to get it. In my defense, I did have an awful lot on my mind.
“I’m pregnant, Maggie.”
I blinked. I looked down at her stomach. She didn’t appear to have one. I looked up into her face again. Maybe this was another of my delusions. “I don’t understand . . . how?”
“The same way men and women have for centuries.”
“What man? Who’s the father?” The last I’d heard she’d sworn off men. A prudent decision, considering her last boyfriend, who I’d told her repeatedly was bad news, had beaten her to within an inch of her life. That scumbag was rotting in prison.
Speaking of prison, my favorite mob boss had disappeared from sight.
Alice pointed to a dark-skinned man, taller than a refrigerator and almost as wide, perched uncomfortably in one of the too-small waiting chairs. He waved. I swear his hand was bigger than my head. He smiled, teeth shiny, gleamy white against chocolate pudding skin. The fact that I was mentally comparing him to chocolate pudding told me I’d eaten too many of my meals in the hospital cafeteria.
I waved weakly in reply.
“C’mon. I’m dying for you to meet him.” Alice grabbed my shoulder and propelled me in his direction like she did when we were seven.
“Where is he from?” I figured it was more polite to ask that than to come right out and ask if he spoke English.
“Chicago.”
Whew! I speak Windy City. Sorta.
“Lamont, this is Maggie,” Alice chirped. “Maggie, Lamont.”
“Nice to meet you.” I extended my hand only to have it swallowed whole by his.
“I’m sorry we have to meet under these circumstances. My condolences on your loss.”
“Thank you. Welcome to New Jersey. How do you like it so far?”
“We-l-l,” he said carefully. “It’s not exactly what I was expecting.”
“If you drive an hour or two in any direction, you can find whatever you want, mountains, ocean, New York city, farms . . . we’ve got it all. Plus, we have all four seasons.” I knew I sounded like some Board of Tourism hack, but I couldn’t stop myself. “Movies and TV haven’t been terribly kind in their portrayal of our fine little state, but I promise there’s plenty here to like.”
Unable to take any more of my sales spiel he said quickly, “I already found what I like.” He pulled Alice toward him. For once she didn’t tower over the guy she was dating.
“How’d you know I was here?” I asked my oldest friend.
“All my stuff’s in storage, and I’d given up my apartment before I left, so I called the bed and breakfast to see if they had a room available. Your aunts fill
ed me in.”
“Which of them?”
“All three.” Alice, who usually had the patience of a saint, rolled her eyes.
I winced. “Sorry ’bout that.”
She shrugged. “Wasn’t your fault. Susan said you’d probably be here, so we borrowed Leslie’s car, which, by the way, reeks of pot. She really shouldn’t be driving while smoking that stuff. We really wanted to get away from Templeton, your Aunt Loretta’s boyfriend. Have you met him?”
I shook my head. He’d exhibited the good taste to skip the funeral, and since I’d ducked out of the wake I hadn’t made the acquaintance of Loretta’s latest love of her life. “I haven’t had the pleasure.”
“You’re going to hate him,” Alice said. Besides being my best friend for decades, she had grown up next door to the B&B, so she was well acquainted with Aunt Loretta’s loves. “Anyway, we rushed over here to check on you.”
Eager to get rid of them so that I could talk to Delveccio, I spun in a circle doing the hokey-pokey. “As you can see, I’m fine.” I glanced at the big guy. “How ’bout you? Meeting all three of my aunts at once must have been . . .”
“A bit overwhelming,” Alice supplied helpfully.
I shook my head. “You’re too kind.”
“I survived,” Lamont said with an easy smile.
Shaking my finger at him, I warned, “Whatever you do, don’t eat the love muffins!”
“Pardon me?”
“At breakfast. Don’t eat the love muffins. They’re terrible. Aunt Loretta, the sex-addict-slash-baker keeps putting weird aphrodisiac ingredients to them.”
“She’s not a sex addict,” Alice said.
“Why? Because it’s only PC to say a man’s a sex addict? The woman has had more lovers than Cassanova!”
Delveccio strolled back in. He glanced in my direction. I thought I saw a tad of annoyance in that look. I really had to find a way to get rid of my Amazonian friend and her even bigger boyfriend. Soon. Preferably before I changed my mind about taking the job, or the offer was rescinded.