Thirty-Two and a Half Complications

by Denise Grover Swank

  “I know.” I took several steps inside, feeling like an intruder. “What are you doin’ in here?”

  “Trying to wrap my head around the possibility of having a baby.” He definitely didn’t sound too happy about the prospect.

  My breath caught and I felt like I was going to throw up. What if he changed his mind about doing this with me?

  “I’m going to let Muffy out, then take a shower and get ready to go to church.”

  His gaze returned to the crib. “I think I’ll skip today. I need to work on my case.”

  “The one you won’t tell me about?” When he didn’t answer, I pressed on. “Does it have to do with the shakeup in the sheriff’s department?” I knew he’d spent months searching reports trying to figure out who was responsible for the leak.

  “No.”

  I held back a groan of frustration. But he’d promised to tell me when he was ready. Besides, it was probably official business he wasn’t supposed to talk about. I had to accept that Mason’s job was cloaked in a lot more secrecy than mine.

  I texted Neely Kate once I was ready, asking her if I could sit with her at church since I’d be alone. She texted back to tell me that she’d pick me up at the farm, which was on her way into town. Ronnie was going fishing, so she’d be alone too.

  Mason was in the office, fully engrossed in his work, when Neely Kate pulled up the drive. He’d been acting distant and I was worried. He was either concerned about his nightmares, me kissing Joe, him hitting Joe, or all of the above. None of it was good. I stood in the doorway, sucking my bottom lip between my teeth as I watched him type on his laptop. Several seconds later, he glanced up and saw me in the doorway.

  I must have had a pitiful look because he spun his chair around and reached for me. “Come here.”

  I went to him and he pulled me onto his lap, giving me a gentle kiss. “I’m sorry I’m not coming with you, but this is important.”

  “I know.”

  His mouth lifted into a soft smile, but his eyes were filled with regret. “I don’t want you to think I’m not going because I’m angry with you.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “I won’t lie. I’m still upset over what happened between you and Joe. But right now I’m more upset with myself. I have some things to sort out.”

  “Okay.” It wasn’t, but there wasn’t anything I could do about it.

  Giddy On Up blared in the silence of the room and I grimaced as I pulled my phone out of my purse and turned it off.

  “Sounds like Neely Kate is waiting for you. You better go.”

  I stood up and turned to leave, but Mason caught my wrist and pulled me back. “I love you, Rose.”

  I swallowed the lump in my throat. “I love you too.”

  Neely Kate knew something was wrong the moment I slid into the passenger seat.

  “What happened?”

  I filled her in on everything that had happened since our phone call.

  “I can’t believe Mason wants you to talk to Samantha Jo.”

  “I think he figures I’m gonna talk to her anyway, so I might as well get helpful information out of it.”

  “Still…”

  “He wouldn’t willingly let me do anything dangerous,” I said, suddenly feeling defensive.

  “Good heavens, Rose. I know that. It’s just I’m so used to you sneaking around, it feels weird being so up front about it.”

  I couldn’t argue with that. “So our original plan of finding her after church works out great. Mason’s working and Ronnie’s fishing.”

  A smile spread across her face. “A girl’s day out!”

  “I’m pretty sure whoever came up with that term wasn’t talking about interrogating suspects in a bank robbery.”

  “For heaven’s sake,” she said in mock annoyance. “We’re simply planning to make a Sunday afternoon call on poor Samantha Jo.”

  The church was mostly packed when we entered the sanctuary, but we found seats about halfway down the aisle in the center of a pew.

  “Rose.” Neely Kate tugged on my sleeve, then pointed to the other side of the aisle. “Look who’s here.”

  Two rows ahead of us, divided by the aisle, was Samantha Jo Wheaton with a big tattooed guy who looked like he’d rather be chewing on glass than sitting in the New Living Hope Revival Church.

  “What’s she doing here?” I asked. “I’ve never seen hide nor hair of her in church.”

  “Guilt makes people look for atonement.” My best friend gave me a smug grin.

  Of course, the explanation could be simpler than that: Jonah’s church was the hot new Sunday morning entertainment. For a town used to hymns sung to organ music and shouted sermons about fire and brimstone, the citizens of Henryetta were flocking to Jonah’s church, which boasted a live band and songs that sounded like they could be on the radio. The fact that the service was televised didn’t hurt. But I didn’t see the point of telling Neely Kate that.

  The band took the stage, the musicians wearing jeans and T-shirts. Momma surely must have been rolling in her grave two miles away. Just as they started to play, someone caught my eye.

  Violet. She was walking down the aisle, wearing her favorite plum-colored dress and her Coach purse, which she only pulled out for special occasions.

  And then I saw what her occasion was.

  She wasn’t alone.

  I realized Neely Kate must have seen them too, because she reached for my arm, her nails digging into the flesh. “How could she?”

  Several people around us turned toward Neely Kate, but she didn’t even notice. She was too busy staring at Violet, who was slipping into the pew, Joe following behind holding Ashley’s hand. Violet must have put Mikey in the nursery.

  Neely Kate was livid. “Didn’t he just kiss you yesterday morning?” she stage-whispered.

  More people turned around, their eyes widening when they realized that she was addressing me. Mason was well liked in the congregation, and everyone knew we were a couple. Several gave me disapproving frowns.

  “Neely Kate,” I hissed into her ear. “People can hear you!”

  “I don’t care. Who does he think—?”

  “Neely Kate!” I said, more insistent. “Think about Mason and me.”

  She pressed her lips together, refusing to sing the first song because she was so busy shooting a laser-like glare in Joe and Violet’s direction. I stole glances of my own, barely able to focus on Jonah’s sermon as I tried to figure out why I cared so much about them spending time together. Joe and I weren’t together, so he could date whomever he wanted. But my sister? Though I was far from convinced there was anything going on between them, it felt wrong on so many levels to see them together.

  And Violet. She was the one who really made me mad. She was jumping from man to man, taking the one who had the most to offer. Joe was currently the flavor of the week, it seemed. Maybe her attempts to reconnect with the mayor had hit a snag. Or maybe she was just trying to prove me wrong about Joe not wanting her.

  Neely Kate was still seething when the service ended, and I suspected what she had in mind as she started to push me out of the pew.

  “Neely Kate! Stop!” I turned and blocked her path. “I can’t face him. Not after yesterday... I need to stay as far away from him as possible.”

  Some of the fire left her eyes.

  I grabbed her arm. “We need to find Samantha Jo. I need to get my money back so I can at least save my portion of the nursery. I love my landscaping business, Neely Kate. And Bruce Wayne likes it too. I don’t want to lose it. I need to put all this other nonsense to the side and focus on getting my money back.”

  “Okay.”

  “But once all the debts are paid, the Gardner Sisters Nursery will no longer exist in its present form.”

  She gasped. “You’re going to split it up?”

  I expected to feel more anger, but instead a heavy weight pressed on my chest. “I can’t work with her anymore. Not after this.”
r />   “Well—” she looped her arm through mine “—let’s focus on getting your money back or there won’t be anything left to split up. Let’s go find Samantha Jo.”

  We headed out the aisle, and I was surprised to see that Violet, Joe and Ashley had already left their pew. Since Violet was making such a show of her presence, I figured she’d spend more time making sure that everyone knew she was here with Joe Simmons, Fenton County Chief Deputy Sheriff, former candidate for the Arkansas State Senate and son of J.R. Simmons, the most powerful man in southern Arkansas.

  And her younger sister’s ex-boyfriend.

  Part of me felt relieved to have dodged that bullet, but the rest of me was a mess, including my guts. I reminded myself of the fact that I’d only just gotten finished convincing Neely Kate we needed to talk to Samantha Jo—not Violet—only she was gone too.

  “Where is she, Neely Kate?”

  “There,” Neely Kate pointed to the exit. “She’s headed for the foyer.” She started pushing her way through the crowd. “Out of the way! Pregnant woman! I’m gonna be sick! Let me through!”

  The crowd parted like the Red Sea, giving her plenty of room to pass.

  I followed on her heels, trying to ignore the glares some of the bystanders were throwing my way. “I’m with her,” I said in my defense, giving them a weak smile. “I hold her hair.”

  But then the visual of Neely Kate hanging over a toilet bowl and retching filled my head and I started to gag.

  Neely Kate heard me and turned around. “Are you okay?”

  “No.” I pushed past her and ran to the bathroom, bursting through the swinging door. I found the first empty stall and ran in, barely getting the door shut before my meager breakfast of toast and coffee came up. When I finally stopped heaving, I waited another minute to make sure I was done.

  Neely Kate was standing outside the stall when I opened the door, her eyes filled with worry. I rinsed out my mouth and stared at her reflection in the mirror.

  “You still haven’t taken the test yet, have you?”

  I shook my head, tears blurring her image.

  “Rose, just find out one way or the other. Put an end to your misery.”

  Tears started to stream down my cheeks and Neely Kate made a pouty face and pulled me into a hug, stroking the back of my head as I cried.

  “It’s not just my worry about being pregnant. It’s Mason. I’ve screwed up something wonderful, Neely Kate. How could I let that happen?”

  “Oh, sweetie. You kissed Joe for a few seconds before coming to your senses and pushing him away. Did you want to jump his bones when you were sitting in the car with him?”

  “Of course not!”

  A loud thud came from the end stall followed by the clatter of something hitting the tile floor. I swung my attention to the corner in time to see a plate of dentures skitter across the floor and land at my feet.

  I screeched and jumped backward, dragging Neely Kate with me until we bumped into the counter. We gasped at the same time when we saw who was inside the stall.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The stall door had flown open and Miss Mildred stood in the opening, her dress hiked up and tucked into her panty hose on one side in the back. Her face was so red I worried she’d have a stroke. She pointed her finger at me. “Jezebel!” she said, her voice heavy with judgment. Only without the top portion of her teeth, it came out muffled.

  “Miss Mildred,” I muttered, backing up more even though there was nowhere else to go. “I didn’t know you were in here.” I shot Neely Kate a glare and her eyes widened as she mouthed, I’m sorry. I didn’t see her.

  “Fat’s obious,” she mumbled out, looking around until she spotted her dentures on the floor at my feet.

  Scrunching her nose in disgust, Neely Kate bent over and picked up the fake teeth. She rinsed them off in the sink—looking like she was about to lose her own breakfast—and then handed them to the elderly woman. Miss Mildred snatched them and popped them into her mouth, wiggling her mouth around to settle them into place.

  Neely Kate, already pale, covered her mouth with her hands and bolted into a stall. The sound of retching soon followed.

  But that didn’t distract Miss Mildred, whose face had settled back into a sour grimace now that her teeth had been restored. “After you helped find Dorothy’s killer, I thought maybe you had seen the light. And I was willing to overlook how you’re tainting the district attorney’s reputation, living with him out there on that farm doin’ God knows what. And now this.” She pointed to my stomach. “While fornicating with another man? It’s inexcusable.”

  “She wasn’t fornicating,” Neely Kate piped up, her voice muffled inside the stall. “She was only kissing him.”

  I froze in shock. My secrets were out in the open, and the president of the Busybody Club knew all of them. “Miss Mildred… I….”

  She advanced toward me. “How can your heathen soul stand to be in the sanctuary of our Lord?”

  I swallowed and lifted my chin, fighting a new wave of nausea as I listened to Neely Kate start another round of vomiting not six feet away from me. “Jesus welcomed the sinners into his fold, Miss Mildred. And so does Jonah.”

  “That boy’s a fool.”

  “Jesus?” Neely Kate called out from behind the closed door.

  “Of course not Jesus! Blasphemy!” Miss Mildred shuddered, then recovered enough to continue, “Reverend Jonah. Lettin’ all them heathens in the door.” She leaned forward, squinting her eyes. “Tattooed ladies and men with earrings. Have you ever seen such a sight?”

  “Jesus ate with the tax collectors, Miss Mildred.”

  “Well, then Reverend Jonah can go out to lunch with Dennis Pontel at the Golden Corral buffet. Dennis works for the IRS.”

  “He works for H&R Block,” Neely Kate called out.

  “Same thing.” Miss Mildred waved her hand in annoyance. “The point is that this is a place for holy people, Rose Anne Gardner. You don’t belong here.”

  My anger rose up. I was tired of this woman belittling me at every step. “Last I checked, Miss Mildred,” I took a step forward, feeling bolder, “we’re in a restroom, which is where crap belongs.” I lifted an eyebrow and gave her a snotty look. “I guess that explains why you’re here spoutin’ off.” Then I stomped out of the bathroom, leaving Miss Mildred frozen in shock by the sinks and poor Neely Kate still barfing.

  I took a second to steady myself, which is when I saw Samantha Jo and her tattooed date talking to a couple of guys who looked like they belonged to the church’s Onward and Upward support group. The majority of the group’s members worked—or had worked—at Weston’s Garage. When Jonah started his church, one of the first things he did was found a support group for men in need of rehabilitation, which included a number of members who had worked for Daniel Crocker. I glanced back at the bathroom door. I would have preferred to wait for Neely Kate before talking to Samantha Jo, but she was doing the telltale tug on her boyfriend’s arm.

  That settled it.

  I made my way through the crowded foyer, approaching her and the group of four men. When I was less than three feet away, I felt my peripheral sight fading as a vision descended.

  I was in a dark room, lit only by the pale light beaming in through a curtainless paned window. One of the panes had a diagonal crack in it, shaped like an upside-down Y.

  “You didn’t have to kill him,” a man grunted as he came into my view, the red glow of the tip of his cigarette lighting up his face. His face was covered in heavy stubble and his cheeks hollowed in as he took a long drag. “You said no one would get hurt.”

  “He wanted out and he never would have kept quiet. It was too risky,” said a guy in the shadows. I couldn’t make out any defining features, but I recognized his voice. “Have you picked out where we’re going next?”

  “It ain’t that easy, Mick. That nine thousand in the cash bag helps, but we need another ten K. This is Henryetta. Where in Sam Hill are we gonna find that mu
ch money?”

  Mick laughed, but the sound came out garbled. “I know just the place.”

  The church foyer came back into view and I blurted out. “You’re gonna rob another place.”

  The heads of all four men turned toward me, their eyes burning with hostility.

  Oh, crappy doodles.

  Even though I’d recognized Mick’s voice, none of the men’s faces matched the guy with the cigarette or the Batman robber whose face I’d seen in my previous vision. I realized in that split second that the person I’d been in the vision had never said a word or given me any other clue of his or her identity. It could have been any of the four men or even Samantha Jo. That meant there were at least four of them, five if I included Mr. Sullivan.

  One of the men in the group stomped over to me, clearly angry. “What did you just say?”

  I put the back of my hand to my forehead and took a step back. “I’m sorry, I don’t remember what I said. I’m not feeling well, and I’ve been blurting out odd things right and left. Must be delirious.”

  I took another step back. He took one forward.

  Fear cramped my already delicate stomach, but the rational part of my brain screamed that we were in church. What could happen?

  The contorted face of the man in front of me made me reconsider that question.

  “Hello, gentleman,” Joe said from behind me, moving to my side and putting a hand on the small of my back. “I’m not sure I’ve had the pleasure of meeting you.” He extended his right hand, keeping his left at my back. “I’m the new chief deputy sheriff. Joe Simmons.” A bright smile lifted his mouth, but his eyes were hard.

  His hand hung in the air for a long moment before the man finally gave it a short shake and then dropped it like it was covered with maggots. “Welcome to town, Sheriff.”

  Joe gave him a cocky grin. “Oh, I’m not the sheriff.” Then he winked and cast me a quick glance. “But you just never know what the future may hold.”

  I wanted to shake him off, but I couldn’t deny Joe had intervened in something that was about to get ugly. To try banishing him now would be foolish.