Ma glared after her, then she turned back to me, jiggling Chris on her hip. “Are you and Max still thinking about buying a new house?”
“Maybe—why?” I couldn’t decide what to eat.
“Linda Faye King has her real estate license now. And she’s working for me part-time in the mornings.”
Gail snorted and slammed a ceramic mug on the counter. I blinked, surprised it didn’t crack.
“Those cost money, you know,” Ma snapped.
Gail replied by slamming another one on the counter.
“So Linda’s not working in the hospital emergency room anymore?” I asked before they started throwing things.
“No.” Ma was glaring at Gail.
“She says she quit, but. . .” Gail’s words trailed off, leaving no doubt that she was suspicious of Linda’s exit from her job.
“Linda just got tired of the hospital.” Ma turned her back on Gail. “I told her you and Max need to move, so she’s looking for houses for you.”
“I didn’t say it was a for-sure thing.”
“You know what they say,” Ma intoned. “The early bird gets the worm. You can never be too prepared.” My mother has an encyclopedia of platitudes embedded in her brain.
Gail snorted louder and stomped to the back room. I wondered what was up with the two of them. I also realized I wasn’t going to be able to stop my mother from doing what she wanted to do once she set her mind to it—like finding me a new house. My best course of action was to just nod and agree. Or change the subject.
“Have you heard anything about Philip Grenville being in town?” I asked.
Lips pursed, she nodded. “He came by for a cup of coffee this morning. Linda Faye served him, and we were all polite, but I didn’t want to be. I haven’t seen him in years. He’s really aged. Looks older than he should, and no wonder. Pervert.”
The word was one of my mother’s favorites to describe men who slept around on their wives.
“Did you tell Abbie?” I was worried about how she would feel being so close to her wedding and having her ex-husband show up.
“No. I haven’t seen her since he came. Really, why would it be important? That man broke her heart.” Ma drew herself up in indignant anger, and Chris laughed in her arms. He couldn’t understand her words and probably thought she was playing. “Her book should have been about a woman killing her ex-husband instead of a man killing his ex-wife.”
“Ma!” I glanced around the shop, hoping the lull in conversations was coincidence and not customers trying to eavesdrop.
“Well, nobody could have blamed Abbie if she’d shot Philip dead. He deserved it years ago. Now she’s finally got a chance at happiness with Eric. He’s such a nice man. A good man. A successful man.”
She sounded a little bit like the Jewish matchmaker in Fiddler on the Roof.
Ma kissed the tip of Chris’s nose. “I wouldn’t have been surprised to hear that some relative of some woman Philip slept with shot him in the head.”
I wasn’t comfortable with the direction this conversation was going. I lowered my voice, hoping she’d take a hint. “So why is Philip in town? Do you know?”
“To ruin Abbie’s wedding, of course.” Someone walked up to the cash register, so Ma handed Chris back to me. He bleated in disappointment, and I stuck a pacifier in his mouth.
As Ma rang up the ticket, she looked over her shoulder at me. “He’d better not bother Abbie. That’s all I have to say. Or you and I will pay him a visit, and I’ll shoot him myself.” Her voice was just as loud as it had been before.
“Well, let’s hope he doesn’t get killed.” I forced a laugh. “You’d be a prime suspect now. You really should be careful about what you say.”
Ma waved at the customer as he left. “I’m always careful about what I say.” She trounced over to the coffee machines.
Ah, the beauty of self-deception. I didn’t bother to argue. It’s my policy not to argue with someone who is always right.
April May Winters walked up to the register. “You have to admit it’s weird timing, given Abbie’s new book and her wedding. Maybe Philip thinks he can somehow get a cut of the money she’s making.”
I shook my head. “Unless an author is a big name, they don’t make a lot.”
April looked skeptical, but I knew for a fact that Abbie was barely making enough money to live.
“You want something to eat?” April May asked.
“Yeah, I do. A turkey club. And a Mountain Dew. And would you please hand me a sugar cookie for Chris?”
“Mountain Dew?” April asked with raised brows. “Not your regular coffee?”
I shook my head. “No. I’ve developed a new bad habit. Caffeine in the form of green sugary fizz.”
A minute later, as she handed me a paper-wrapped cookie and the drink, face squished into a frown, she glanced over her shoulder at Ma. “If this keeps up with Gail and Doris, I’m going to look for another job.”
I followed her gaze. If looks could kill, Gail and Ma would have killed each other dead. Gail had worked for Ma since she’d started her business. And April had been working here for several years.
“You mean this isn’t like one of their normal fights?”
She shook her head a smidgen and leaned toward me. “No. I’ll tell you about it when I bring your food.”
I got a table and put Chris, whose mouth was still plugged with the pacifier, in a high chair and then dropped into my own chair. Although the dining room was full and people were back to talking again, the place seemed strange without the background of Ma and Gail tossing comments back and forth. I never thought I’d say it, but I missed them ganging up to snipe at me.
April was on her way to my table with my order when a big blue WWPS truck pulled up outside in the parking lot. When the blue-uniformed man leaped from the driver’s side and strolled toward the shop door carrying a box, April stopped midstep to stare at him. As far as I could see, every other woman in the place turned to look, too. Even my mother.
“April!” I stage-whispered.
“Huh?” She ripped her gaze from him as he walked through the door.
“You’re gawking.”
“Oh. . .oh.” She almost tripped hurrying with her tray to my table. After she set it down, she slipped into a chair, positioned so she could still see him. “Wow.”
I had to admit, the man was fine. I should know. I’m married to a man who has the same kind of effect on women. But despite his attributes, this guy didn’t have the same whatever it was that Max had.
“He’s new,” April said. “His name is Clark.”
“As in Clark Kent? Like Superman?”
“Mmm.” April smiled. “But his last name is Matthews.” I checked him out. He did have a certain resemblance to the man of steel. I wondered if this was the same guy who had broken open the bags of kitty litter at Adler’s Pet Emporium. He and my mother were in conversation at the counter. He told her how good her coffee was and that he could never get enough. Her angry persona melted. Then I heard her giggle. My mother never giggles.
While I wanted to stare at my mother’s unusual behavior with the same freakish fascination with which a person rubbernecks at the aftermath of a car wreck, I had to find out from April what was going on with Ma and Gail, so I tore my attention from the front of the shop and put it on April. Chris slapped his chair with open palms and rocked back and forth.
“What’s with Gail and Ma?”
“What?” She turned dreamy, unseeing eyes toward me.
I snapped my fingers in front of her face. “Come on, April. Snap out of it.”
She blinked. “Oh. Sorry.”
I leaned toward her. “If you like him so much, why don’t you go say hello?”
“Oh, I couldn’t do that. He’s just too. . .well. . .no way.” This did not sound like the April I knew, but whatever.
“All right. Then tell me what’s going on with Gail and Ma.”
April tensed and finally met my
eyes directly. “They’re fighting. Over Linda.”
“Linda?”
“Yeah. Linda Faye King. Your mom hired her part- time to help early in the mornings because Gail has to temporarily come in two hours late. Linda is also helping to cater Abbie’s wedding reception. Gail is really mad.”
“Why?”
April shrugged. “I don’t know. Gail won’t say. Linda always seemed nice to me, although sometimes she seems to be living in another dimension.”
“How did Ma end up hiring her?” I asked.
“She was here at the right time when your mother was super busy. Gail hadn’t come in yet. She has to take her granddaughter to school right now. Well, Linda’s gotten into real estate and was coming in here every morning to get coffee. She overheard your mom talking about needing some temporary help in the morning. She needs some extra cash.”
Chris spit out his pacifier and began to cry. I gave him the sugar cookie. I’m not above bribing my kids with sweets to get them to cooperate.
April glanced over my shoulder, and her eyes widened.
I turned around to see what she was looking at, and lo and behold, Clark was approaching our table.
“Hey, April.”
She gaped up at him and said nothing, so I kicked her under the table.
“Uh. . .” She inhaled. “Hi.”
He smiled. The man had it. But unlike Max, Clark seemed to know the effect he had on women and used it.
“You doin’ okay, April?” Clark stretched, showing off his biceps.
“Uh-huh,” she grunted.
“Well, good.” His gaze lingered on her, and he rolled back and forth on his black walking shoes.
He had a copy of Abbie’s book in his hand. Since April was stunned into silence, I thought I’d fill the gap to give her time to recover.
“Are you going to read that?” I asked.
His gaze slid to me, as if seeing me for the first time, and the fingers of his empty hand drummed a spastic rhythm on his thigh. He glanced down at the book and shook his head. “No. It’s for my mom. She’s a big mystery reader, and she’s been waiting for this one.”
“Does she live around here?” I asked.
“Yep. I just moved her into a house outside of town. She hasn’t been well, and I’m taking care of her.”
“Wow.” April drew out the word, making it sound as though Clark had done something supermanly heroic. “That’s so nice of you.”
I bit my lip to keep from laughing. The man was only doing what most people normally do.
He preened a little bit and shrugged. “Gotta watch out for family, you know.”
“Wow,” April repeated.
I had a sudden thought that might help April out. “You know what? Abbie Grenville, the author of that book, is my best friend. I could get a bookplate for that book personally autographed for your mother. Then I could deliver it to your house.” With April in tow.
“Now that would be really nice,” he said. “My mother’s name is Eunice Matthews.”
April stared at him with rapt attention. I was tempted to look more closely to see if she was drooling.
“Well, I guess I’ll see you later.” He winked at April, waved, turned on his heel, and strolled out of the shop.
I thought April had stopped breathing again. I patted her arm. “It’s okay. He only said hello. He didn’t declare his undying love or anything.” I paused. “Okay, well, he didn’t really say hello; he said, ‘Hey, April.’”
“I know.” She took a deep breath, which relieved me. I had been afraid she was going to faint. “Wow.” She turned glazed eyes toward me. “He knows my name.”
“April!” Gail hollered. “We need you over here.”
“Gail knows your name, too,” I murmured.
April stood up, mumbled good-bye to me, and floated back to work. At least she’d been distracted from looking for another job.
As I ate my sandwich, I watched my mother and Gail. Now they were making wide swaths around each other to avoid accidentally touching, and there was no eye contact between them at all. When they did speak, their words were clipped and harsh. I found myself wishing one of them would just turn to the other and say something nice. Like I’d felt when I observed Jaylene and Henry.
A simple effort on the part of just one of them could end the ongoing hostility.
Chapter Two
As I turned the key in the SUV, my cell phone rang from the depths of my purse. I flung pens, receipts, and other things aside as I dug for it. As was my habit, I didn’t bother to look at the screen to check the caller ID.
I jammed the phone against my ear. “Hello?”
“Patricia?”
The caller was the one person in the world who calls me by my given name. Lady Angelica Louise Carmichael Cunningham, otherwise known as my mother-in-law.
“Hello, Angelica.” Despite my best efforts not to be intimidated, I always find myself speaking more properly with her.
“How are you, dear?”
“I’m fine. How are you?” Angelica never calls me without a reason, so I stiffened in preparation for whatever she was going to say.
“I’m well. How are the children?”
“Everyone is good.” I opened the center console in the SUV and pawed through the contents, looking for a headset. I found cleansing wipes, a bottle of germ killer, pens, fast-food napkins, and a slightly used mint. Where was my headset? “The kids are fine. So is Max.”
I heard her brief intake of breath and braced myself for what she would say next.
“Has Sammie stopped indulging in her unfortunate. . .habit?”
I dropped the lid on the console. It bounced once then shut.
“Mamamamamamamama,” Chris chanted from his car seat.
“What’s that noise?” Angelica asked. “Are you still there?”
“It’s Chris. I’m here.” Talking with gritted teeth and stiff lips is nearly impossible.
“Did you hear my question? Has Sammie—”
“Sammie is fine,” I said, trying to force my jaw muscles to relax.
“I’ve spoken to some of my friends and found the name of a child psychiatrist.”
This is a test, I told myself. Only a test. Chris began smacking his hands on his car seat in rhythm with his repetitious monosyllable.
“Patricia?”
I took a deep breath. “Sammie is going to be fine. She’s just developed a habit of picking things up off the floor and putting them in her pockets. It’s not a big deal. She’s—”
“Kleptomania is a serious mental disorder, dear.”
“Klepto. . .what are you saying? What exactly did Max tell you she’s doing?”
“Stealing,” Angelica said.
I knew my husband would never say such a thing. He had agreed with me that it was probably just a phase. At least that’s what he told me.
“She’s not stealing,” I said. “She’s a neatnik. She just picks things up off the ground and the floor.”
“And puts them in her pockets!” Angelica sighed long and hard. “Sometimes it takes longer for mothers to see the truth about their children.”
Well, that was an accurate statement, but I happen to know that a person’s version of the truth can be subjective, based on their perception of reality. And that was the big problem here. Angelica and I rarely perceived reality the same way.
“Sammie says she’s worried about Chris,” I said. “This didn’t start until he began trying to crawl. Unfortunately, Sammie watched a show where a toddler choked to death on something he got off the floor.”
“Whatever you believe, dear, but this is why she needs a distraction. Have you made a decision?”
She was referring to the kitten, and I wouldn’t let myself be fooled by her use of the endearment. She used words like weapons, shooting them like friendly fire that kills just as dead as enemy fire. I decided to play with her head.
“A decision? Um, about what?”
I heard her delicate
sigh. “About the cat, dear. Maxwell said he’s leaving it all up to you. . .” Her voice trailed off.
Which I don’t understand at all. . . I completed her sentence in my head. “Oh yes. The cat.” I paused just long enough to irritate her. “Yes, I’ve made a decision.”
“And?” Her tone of voice changed. “This. . .is important. Not just for Sammie.”
That was an odd statement for her to make. Was that vulnerability I heard in her voice? I felt a niggle of guilt. Playing with her head—anybody’s head—wasn’t nice. And the Lord had been trying to teach me to be nice for a long time now. I had only to look at the Adlers to see the end result of not being kind to someone.
“I’ve decided that Sammie can have the cat.”
“Good.” Relief laced the satisfaction in her voice. “She needs to pick which kitten she wants from the litter. She gets first choice.”
“Why now?” I asked. “They aren’t ready to leave their mother yet.”
“That’s the way it’s done, dear,” Angelica said. “What time this afternoon after she gets home from school is good? Hayley will be home after we play tennis.”
Give someone an inch, and they’ll take a mile, as my mother would say. I’d given my mother-in-law just the tiniest bit of leverage by agreeing to the kitten, and now she was taking over, which she’d do in every area of my life if I let her. Just like my mother. But unlike my mother, Angelica doesn’t believe I’m good enough to be a Cunningham, along with my many other failures of character. Unfortunately, I resent that.
“Patricia?”
“Tell Hayley around four.”
Angelica said good-bye and I hung up, wondering how I got into these things. My life was being controlled by two domineering women, not to mention all the demands from my family. I felt like I was losing myself.
I needed to go back to work. That was all there was to it. Not to the self-storage business. When I left there, we turned the running of daily operations over to our office manager, Shirl. She was doing a great job. We’d even hired help for her.
But maybe I could get a job in another part of the Cunningham family business. Angelica had nothing to do with any of that. Max and his father had recently begun work on a housing development. Perhaps I could help with that. For the first time since I’d gotten up that morning, I felt a twinge of excitement.
Kitty Litter Killer Page 2
