More silence as Dixie watched the wheels turn inside Louella’s head. She hoped that meant Louella was considering her proposition.
“So if you stop, I’ll stop,” Dixie continued. “Swear it. And I’ll never steal another man from you for as long as I live. My hand to God,” she joked, hoping to lighten their conversation. “Deal?”
Louella looked at Dixie’s hand as if it was smeared in cow dung, turning her nose up at it. She leaned in close so Dixie wouldn’t miss a venomous word. “I won’t stop until you’re gone from this town, Dixie. You and your bunch of ex-hooker friends are a blight on Plum Orchard’s good name. No one wanted you to come back to begin with. After what you did to poor Em tonight, I’d bet they want you here even less.”
Louella spun on her heel, picking her way across the square, leaving behind a haunting tune of pending doom playing in Dixie’s head.
* * *
Sanjeev’s quiet presence made her turn around to acknowledge him before returning to packing her bags.
Mona and Lisa stretched their bulky bodies, whimpering their joy at his presence.
“So you’re running away?”
“You heard?”
“Who hasn’t, Dixie? The Maldives heard. They called, by the way. Something about an offer for a place to hide?”
Dixie snorted. “Don’t you start on me, Sanjeev. I’m not running away or hiding because I did something wrong. I would never, ever betray Em’s trust. Are you kidding me? What little trust I had was like earning a seat on the space shuttle to Mars. But I can’t seem to convince anyone of that.” She’d texted Em five times since she’d walked back from the square to nothing but profound silence.
And it hurt. But it had proven something to her. No matter what the situation, no one would ever say, “Not a snowball’s chance in hell would Dixie Davis ever do that.” She’d always be the scapegoat. While that was more than fair, it was no way to live.
Sanjeev placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. “You’ve convinced me, Dixie. Landon always said you’d come around. He was right. I believe.”
She scooped up a pile of her underwear and dumped them into the suitcase. “I’m a real beacon of hope for mean girls everywhere.”
“Does this mean you’ll forfeit the contest, too, Dixie?”
Yes. It meant she was forfeiting everything that had to do with Plum Orchard. Caine, Em, the Mags, and Call Girls. For a little while, she’d convinced herself you really could come home again. She’d basked in the familiar, fallen in love all over again with her small town, despite the small minds and gossip. She’d found a way to ignore the comments and whispers—until tonight.
“Yes. I’m forfeiting. I’m only causing trouble for the girls anyway, Sanjeev. Louella and every last one of the Mags want them gone. Me in the mix makes her want them doubly gone. If I’m out, maybe she’ll ease up a little and let them live their lives in peace.”
“And if she doesn’t?”
“Poison some of that fabulous curry you make and take it to her house for dinner, for me, would you?”
Sanjeev laughed, tightening his hand on her shoulder and forcing her to turn around. “Dixie?”
“Sanjeev?”
His somber eyes, full of peace and understanding, gazed into hers. “It’s always darkest before the dawn.”
Her clipped laughter dripped sarcasm. “It doesn’t mean my days aren’t always going to be dark just because the sun comes up. I think I’ve proven that. You can have buckets full of sunshine and still have a really crappy day.”
He tilted his dark head, his deep brown eyes searching hers. “I think what it really means is things have to be intolerable before they’re tolerable.”
She cupped his cheek and stroked the smooth, enviably perfect skin with her thumb. “Look at you, all learning the ways of the American. And after all this time. I’m so proud.”
But Sanjeev frowned and shook his head. “Who’ll see to Em and the boys? Who’ll protect her from that wretch Louella and her evil Magnolia posse if not you?”
Dixie turned away and threw a batch of socks on top of her underwear. “I can’t protect someone who would rather see my entrails wrapped around a tree and tied in a bow, Sanjeev.”
“It isn’t like you haven’t stood up to things like this before. It never stopped you in the past.”
“In the past I had no shame. Nowadays, I have so much I could open a shame bank and share my endless supply with the shameless of the world.”
“I wish you’d reconsider, Dixie. You’re meant to be here.”
Dropping one of her scarves into the pile, she twisted her fingers into it to keep from screaming her frustration. “I wish you weren’t the only one that believed me. But you’re an island, my friend.”
“You do know that your past will always make you have to prove yourself in the present, don’t you?”
“Is that your way of telling me whenever something horrible happens, I’m always going to be the most likely suspect?”
“I suppose it is.”
“Well, thanks for clearing that up. If I wasn’t aware of that before tonight, I’m pretty clear now.”
“You’re being saucy.”
“And just a little mouthy,” she admitted. “I could do it as long as the gossip and sly comments were just about me. I can handle it because I invented it. But now it involves Em and her children. I can’t allow that. I won’t.”
“Did you speak to Emmaline?”
“She’s not talking to me. I want to help, Sanjeev. Can you even imagine how horrible this will be for her and the boys? She was so afraid everyone would find out. She knew exactly how everyone would react, and she was right.”
“That you’re more concerned for Emmaline and the boys than your own persecution surely proves you would never share such a sensitive issue, doesn’t it?”
“Not when you’ve done the things I’ve done, Sanjeev. Wasn’t it you just a minute ago who said I’d always be suspect? Though, I wish someone would look at the evidence a little closer. What could I possibly gain from exposing something like that? Or from gossiping about it? When I did some of the things I did, I did them to gain something. Like a boyfriend who had a car. Or a seat on the Miss Cherokee Rose float.”
“Who do you think would do something so distasteful? Are you certain no one else knew?” Sanjeev prodded.
Dixie bobbed her head. “The only other person who knew was Marybell. She was there when Em told us, and I can promise you, she’d never betray Em.”
Sanjeev’s face grew skeptical. “Of that you’re sure?”
Yes. She knew Marybell would never hurt anyone, let alone Em. “I’m positive, Sanjeev. I wouldn’t even insult her by asking her a question like that. So how did someone all the way here in Plum Orchard find out about what Clifton’s been doing in Atlanta? Besides, Marybell wouldn’t think twice about someone cross-dressing. She’s a phone-sex operator, for gravy’s sake. It’s no big deal to her. She loves Em. Everyone at Call Girls does.”
She loved Em, damn it.
Sanjeev clapped his hands together as if they’d made some revelation. “Then we’ve narrowed our suspects, yes? It was clearly someone who is mean of spirit. I can name at least one woman. Cough—Louella Palmer—cough,” he joked, running his words together.
Defeat crushed her just thinking about trying to prove it. If Louella had done this, she wouldn’t leave a trail of evidence that led back to her. She wasn’t that stupid. “Listen, Matlock, we’re not narrowing anything. I almost don’t want to know who’d do something so cruel because it would be all I could do not to bring the old Dixie back for some good old-fashioned stoning. And what would Louella gain by doing something so evil?”
Sanjeev, usually so serene and unruffled, sighed in aggravation. He gripped her arm, making her stop what she
was doing. “She’d hurt you, Dixie, of course! It’s clear she’ll use any avenue to get to you. You don’t really think she opposes Call Girls, do you? She opposes you being here because of Call Girls, which is why she attacked LaDawn and Marybell. She saw your friendship with Emmaline blossoming. If she makes you miserable enough to give her exactly what she wants, which is your swift departure back to Chicago, she’ll use whoever and whatever it takes to do so. How can you not see that?”
Dixie shook her head in disbelief. “But this involved Em’s children, Sanjeev. That’s unbelievably cruel, even for Louella.”
“Bah,” he groused, throwing an impatient hand up. “She eats nails for breakfast and kicks walkers out from under unsuspecting senior citizens. Louella’s blinded by her jealousy of you. As you well know, that ugly emotion can produce uncharacteristic behavior.”
That emotion she was painfully aware of. “Nobody knows the green-eyed monster like I do. In fact, I think I slept with him once.”
Sanjeev wasn’t biting at her joke. He was, however, becoming exasperated with her. The tic in his jaw pulsed, a rare occurrence for him to become ruffled. “Then the answer is clear. You have to stay in order to slay the monster.”
“I can’t slay something if my heroine is uncooperative. Em’s never going to forgive me. And if what you say about Louella turns out to be true, then I’m going back to Chicago where no one knows me enough to hate my guts quite like that—or hurt anyone else who’s even remotely involved with me.”
“Ah, to lick your wounds,” he baited with a sly smile.
She clenched her teeth together. “Yes.”
“And to poverty.”
“That, too.” And to work at McDonald’s until she paid off her debts.
“And Caine?”
Right. And Caine. Dixie’s heart sank like a rock, landing in her stomach and settling there. “What about Caine?” she asked nonchalantly.
“You’ll leave without saying goodbye to him? He’ll be distressed to see he didn’t have the chance to crow his phone-sex victory.”
“I haven’t seen him since last night. When the smoke clears, I’m sure he’ll resurface. Give him my best.” Her offhand attitude helped hide the searing pain in her heart.
“How unlike him to disappear when there’s a damsel in distress.”
“Well, you’re forgetting who the damsel is. I’d disappear if I could, if I were him, too.”
“Still, very curious...”
Dixie breathed deeply, forcing her next words out of her mouth. “It’s better we don’t see each other anyway.”
“Really then? I wouldn’t have thought that was how you felt by the way the two of you have seen so much of each other recently.”
Her stomach twisted into a tight knot. She closed her eyes to wash away Caine’s face—to keep the memory of their last moments together at bay. “That’s all part of our dysfunction. We can’t stay away from each other. But it’s time to end the cycle. I won’t ever be the kind of woman Caine needs, and I definitely can’t live up to his high expectations. There’s no breathing room for me to screw up—or be accused of screwing up. If I’m always going to be suspect, I’ll spend every waking moment proving to him and everyone else I’m innocent if something goes wrong. That’s no way to have a relationship, and you know it, Sanjeev. It’s done, and that’s that.”
“Then there’s nothing left to say but goodbye, is there?”
Dixie dropped her makeup bag and turned around when she heard how hoarse Sanjeev’s voice had become.
He held out his arms, and she went to him, squeezing her eyes shut to keep from shedding more tears. “I’ll miss you so much, Sanjeev. Thank you—for everything. The wonderful meals, the company, but most of all, for your friendship.”
“If I can’t talk you into staying, will you at least remember this one thing?”
“More twisted clichés and metaphors to suit my pathetic existence?”
“Mona likes the cheesy beef kibble, but particular Lisa will only eat the chicken.”
Dixie laughed into his shoulder and nodded, squeezing him extra hard so she had his soothing warmth to carry her back to Chicago.
Sanjeev pulled away first, tilting her chin upward with one finger, his eyes glossy. “Until next we meet, Dixie Davis.”
“Until next time,” she whispered, biting the inside of her cheek to fight the tremble of her lips.
And then he was gone, and Dixie was left alone with nothing but the tick of the clock on her dresser.
Right back where she’d begun.
Twenty
Caine dropped into the ugly red chair in his Miami condo living room and made a face at the chair the overpriced interior designer Landon had sent to redecorate when he’d bought the place had chosen. “It’s still damn ugly, and it’s still uncomfortable, and I don’t give a shit if it’s facing the ocean,” he complained to his phone after reading another of Landon’s texts.
Are you lonesome tonight? Is your heart filled with pain? Will you come back again? Tell me, Caine, are you lonesome tonight?
It was as if the bastard knew what he was doing—how he felt at any given moment. And yes, he was lonesome. Lonesome for home, lonesome for family, lonesome for Dixie and he’d only been gone a day.
There. All out in the open now.
Now, what to do about it. How to go about it. How to fix this for good. How to trust again. How to explain everything to Dixie.
He closed his eyes and took a deep breath—when he opened them again, he saw nothing that made him feel as if any of this was even his. Everything in his condo had been picked out by someone else, carefully placed by a stranger’s hand, and he hated most of it.
And he never realized how much he hated it until just this moment. How much he’d dreaded getting on that plane to come back to it.
He wanted to go home and stay home—for good.
With Dixie. If she’d have him after what he’d done.
Maybe she’d be angry. Maybe she’d be really angry.
He’d been hard on her. Too hard. Too unforgiving. An asshole. He’d tested, he’d pushed, he’d taunted—and still, she’d damn well soldiered on.
He wanted this Dixie. Maybe more than he’d ever wanted her.
But maybe she won’t want you?
Maybe not, but he wasn’t going out without a fight.
His phone chirped, leaving him leery. One more taunting text message from the grave...his eyes fell to the phone, concern instantly replacing his irritability. “Sanjeev? Is everything okay?”
“No, Caine Donovan, nothing is okay.”
As he listened to Sanjeev tell him what happened at the Founder’s Day picnic, his blood boiled over. “Son of a bitch,” he growled into the phone.
“Something must be done, Caine.”
“I’ll handle it. Thanks, buddy.”
Sanjeev’s sigh of relief only added to his anxiety. Sanjeev rarely stuck his nose into anything. When he did, Landon always said that was when you should sit up and take notice.
Caine sat up, his fingers skipping through a quick Google search. Tapping the number that came up, he added it to his phone and dialed it while his teeth clenched tight.
“Louella? Caine Donovan. We need to talk.”
* * *
“I’m sorry to drag you in here on your last night in Plum Orchard, Dixie, but Marybell’s down with the flu, and you know how busy Saturday nights are around here,” Cat apologized. “You were the only option. Sheree’s out of town, and LaDawn can only handle so many calls. I’ll divert the calls for the girls to you. Just do your best.”
Dixie’s plan had been to leave as fast as she could throw her bag and Mona and Lisa into her car, and drive until she was too tired to drive anymore, until Cat called and asked if she’d t
ake Marybell’s shift. “I’m happy to help,” she offered dully, adjusting the box for her personal belongings.
“No you’re not. You want to get in your car and drive the hell out of here as fast as your beat-up old car can go.”
“Like I’m on fire,” she tried to joke, but it sounded bleak and depressing.
Cat pulled her into a hug, rubbing her back. “I wish you’d reconsider. You were beating Caine by at least twenty-five percent. You could’ve had it all if that kept up.”
Dixie breathed deeply, her stomach a jumble of butterflies, all fighting to find their way out of her intestines. “If all means Em hating my guts and the rest of Plum Orchard giving me the stink eye, I’d rather not have it all. I’ll settle for just some.”
“Not a single one of us believe you were responsible, Dixie. Not one of us. Em’ll come around.”
Dixie forced herself to smile. She would not be pathetic. If she was going, she was going with her head held high. “Not even LaDawn? Look at me, winning friends and influencing people.”
Cat held her away from her. “LaDawn was your biggest supporter. She offered to find out who did this to Em and drop them off at her old place of business in Atlanta.”
“Aw, LaDawn and me sittin’ in a tree. Surely her offer to have someone beaten to death for me is a sign of her undying devotion,” she teased, gripping Cat’s hand. Despite her preconceived notions about what the women of Call Girls would be like, she’d fallen in love with them. Had come to respect their grit and determination to survive. “I’m really going to miss you guys.”
“You don’t gotta miss us if you don’t go nowhere, Dixie. Closed mouths don’t get fed, as my mama, rest her soul, used to say! Cain’t win a contest if you ain’t playin’!” LaDawn shouted from her office.
Dixie couldn’t help but laugh before Cat sobered and said, “You’re only givin’ that awful Louella what she wants, Dixie. You know that, right?”
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