“Are you all right?” I asked right back.
“Yeah. I mean…yeah, I’m okay.”
“So, what was that about?”
“They, that is Lonnie and that bitch, bought that old Victorian over on the other side of Curtis’s place, you know, just a few miles down the big road, not far from here. She likes to roam around in the country like she owns all of it. But I reckon it’s better than when we had ’em living practically next door,” Shalonda said. “It’s still too damn close, though.”
“But what was…I mean, that woman is vile and contemptible.”
“Yep, she’s that all right. Contemptible, eh? Ain’t that a nice lawyer word for trashy as shit. You didn’t get in any of that poison ivy, did you?”
“So…?”
“This thing with Colleen. See, she hates me.”
Yeah, being college-educated and all, I’d pretty much figured that out from the things Colleen had yelled at Shalonda. “Why?” I asked. “You seem like a real nice woman to me, kind of tenderhearted even.”
“Well, it’s Lonnie. Him and me. We had…this thing right after high school. Carried it over to college. But him being this blond future country-music star that was going to run for Congress after his string of hit records and all, he quit me. Truth was, he was aiming for trading up.”
“Hey, there weren’t any flies on you, and you were headed for the Olympics,” I said.
“Well, yep, and I might’ve got to the Olympics, but, hell, stuff happens. Lonnie and me, that’s part of what happened. When that man broke up with me, I got so blue I quit college for a while so’s I wouldn’t be running into him. I came on home, and we plain lost track of each other.”
So far, it sounded like a typical high-school-to-college romance. Only person I knew who had actually married his high school sweetheart was my brother Dan. But the way Shalonda was telling it made me think maybe there was a part of her that had never really gotten over Lonnie.
“And when things didn’t work out for Lonnie either in Nashville or up North, he came back, married. Only he didn’t bring his wife right off, and he didn’t tell me ’bout her, and I didn’t know Demetrious yet, and…well, you know.”
“So, y’all had another little fling, and Colleen heard about it when she did get to town?”
“Yep. And when I found out that man had him a wife he hadn’t bothered to mention till she showed up in person, I hit him upside the head so hard she had to take his white ass to the ER.”
“Demetrious know?”
“White girl, you forget where you’re at? Everybody knows.”
She paused, with a dramatic air, and I said, “Okay, what’s the rest of the story?”
“That’s how I met Demetrious. See, Colleen called the cops on me, and Demetrious investigated. He was a detective then, on his way right up to being the first African-American chief of police.”
“He arrest you?”
“Naw, he made one of those police-officer-on-the-street judicial determinations, and told Colleen it was justified, and she’s been mean-mouthing us both ever since.”
That wasn’t all I wanted to hear on the matter of Shalonda’s life since high school, but Shalonda looked at her watch. “Damn, we better get back to your car. I’ve had ’bout enough of white folks yelling at me today, and I’m not taking any chances on Simon catching us hotfooting down his road. That Colleen is just as likely to call him and report us for trespassing as she is to spit on me.”
I peered at my own watch. It wasn’t even close to five yet. I wondered if Simon would leave work on the word of a vile big-haired woman so he could catch us walking down his gated road. For me, I would have taken the chance; I mean, after all, he wasn’t going to shoot us, but something about the set of Shalonda’s jaw told me it was time to get back to town.
After a quick jog back down Simon’s private road, we jumped into the Honda and roared off toward town.
But when Shalonda didn’t go back to singing, I went back to asking questions.
“Have the resort folks threatened y’all with eminent domain proceedings to get your property?”
“Not the county or the resort folks, no. That marina and resort are planned for the eastern shore of what’s now Little Sleepy Lake, and will be Big Sleepy Lake. Only they’re gonna call it something fancy. Takes in all of Jubal and Hank’s place. Then the housing subdivision is set for the southeastern area, where access to I–10 and U.S. 319 is easiest. The flooding to make the big lake will all be on the north shore, so those of us here on the southwestern and western corner are okay. For now.”
“So, nobody’s tried to buy you out?”
“Oh, yeah. Several times. Folks figure the housing development will spread to us eventually. We keep saying no just as loud and plain as we know how, but they keep sending folks out here. But so far nobody’s offered us much, probably because we’re off from where the main roads are.”
“What about my grandmom’s place?”
“Hadn’t heard a thing about that. You’d have to ask Simon.”
Yeah, I had a few things to ask Simon, didn’t I?
chapter 17
Deep in the heart of Dixie lay a deep freeze with jelly eggs.
What the hell was that all about anyway, I wondered, as I steered my ancient Honda into the parking lot of the appliance store that had sent two deliverymen to Willette’s house, with something that seemed to have started all this muddle.
And since nobody else was showing the slightest interest in finding out what, Demetrious being all caught up with getting Big Beauty ready for Mule Day, it was up to me to figure it out.
As soon as I pushed my way inside the doors of the store, a short man with a beak nose and a tuft of hair around his round head stuck out his hand at me and asked, “Can I hep you?”
Yes, of course he could, if he knew anything and was loose of tongue. “Do you have anything to do with delivering deep freezes and refrigerators?”
“We can deliver anything to anyone inside the county limits, you jes’ pick out what you want, only fifty dollar extra.”
“Only? Fifty?” I glanced at the used appliances along the side of the wall and thought half of them weren’t even worth fifty dollars. But what I said was, “Do you know anything about a deep freeze delivered to Willette Cleary’s house and left on her porch?”
He frowned at me. “You’re not from here, are you?” he asked.
“I grew up here.”
His expression suggested he didn’t believe me. My expression suggested I didn’t care.
“About that deep freeze—”
“I didn’t have nothing to do with that,” he said, and took not one but two steps backward.
“What about the two deliverymen? Are they available?”
“No, ma’am, they up and quit and took jobs in Valdosta.”
“Then I need to speak to the person who was in charge of that delivery.”
“He ain’t here,” Short Man said, taking another step backward. “Ain’t a coming back, I don’t reckon.”
“Who’s he?”
“Our assistant manager, Ray Glenn, he’s the one that crazy old woman done shot dead.”
“Permit me to introduce myself. I’m Lilly Cleary, attorney at law, and the daughter of ‘that crazy old woman.’”
At that, Short Man jumped back from me several steps at once. “I don’t got nothing to say to you.” And he literally ran back into an office and slammed the door.
Well, that was interesting, I thought, and started right after him until I realized he had left me alone and unguarded.
There being no one else in the store, customer or employee, I glanced around a bit, thought things grossly overpriced and over-dusty, and then I rifled in earnest through some loose paperwork on the desk in the corner by a phone. Bunch of bills, delivery orders, but not a single thing with a Cleary name on it. There was a computer sitting right there on the desk, and in no time at all, I was looking at all the accounts receivable. T
here it was, still listed: Willette Cleary owed them $600 in round figures for a refrigerator, and the store was adding interest weekly. Mentally, I started drafting the threatening letter on my law firm’s glossy letterhead, fully intending to scare the pants off the new debt collector.
After playing around some more on the computer, searching inside all the desk drawers, and finding little of interest or value, I figured there was nothing else I could plunder through. I picked up a phone book and I looked up Ray Glenn’s address, repeated it a couple of times to myself, and left.
Frustrated, but with my trouble radar on full alert, I drove by the address the phone book gave for Ray Glenn Fussele. The house was one of those fake Gone With the Wind things with tacky but expensive pseudo-Grecian columns out front, and a big yard. Even by Bugfest standards, this house didn’t come cheap. I pulled into the circle driveway, got out, and pounded on the front door. No one answered—not unexpected, given that the owner was dead and left no family behind, according to the obit I’d hastily read in the local newspaper.
Not one to pass up golden opportunities, I peered in the windows and did a quick risk-benefit analysis of breaking in, but ruled it out for now, because it was broad-open daylight. But I definitely wondered how a bill collector and assistant manager could afford such an expensive house.
While I was still stalking the premises, a big car drove up. I watched as a blond man jumped out of the driver’s seat and hustled over toward me, poised as I was, looking in a side window of the big house.
Great. Probably the president of the Home Owners Security Team or something. I busied my mind for the best lie, and then stared at the man gaining on me.
Well, damn, it looked like none other than Big Lonnie Ledbetter himself. That is, if my memory adjusted for twenty years of aging had conjured up the right face.
It was almost karmic, I thought, staring at Lonnie as he stopped right smack-dab in front of me, seeing as how I was definitely interested in yelling at him for selling my grandmother’s house to Simon McDowell without first offering it to me per my repeated written requests.
“Liar and double-crosser,” I said. “You son of a bitch. You betrayed me.”
The man stopped sauntering toward me, and stared hard, and for a moment I wondered if I had just yelled at the wrong person.
But then he flipped his blond bangs out of his eyes in a gesture I remembered, and I noticed he still had the same damn haircut as he did way back when.
“You lied, and you broke your promise, and you betrayed me, you skunk,” I shouted.
We glared at each other for a moment.
“I know you?” he asked.
And this from a man I had once had a huge and stupid crush on. I hated remembering my infatuation, embarrassed I’d been caught in the act of being typical, falling for the high school’s own version of a future Nashville star, the guy who played guitar and sang a bit like Vince Gill.
Lonnie hadn’t much returned my crush, though I had to admit in my memories, he had been nice enough to me. And, as we went round two in our staring contest, I had to admit he was still a fine-looking man, though I could see the soft belly under his knit polo. Still a big, strapping blond, more California surfer than country-western, even if he wasn’t keeping up his gym membership. No wonder he could sweet-talk himself into being a county commissioner in no time at all—tall and handsome still gets votes.
Looking at Lonnie now made me remember the last time I had seen him, at my high school graduation. That night, packed in with the other graduating seniors on the football field, all I could think about was this: Getting Out. My parents had not bothered to attend graduation, my grandmother was dead, and Delvon and Farmer Dave were in Atlanta, making a delivery of some homegrown weed. Only my grandfather and my brother Dan had come to the ceremony to see me graduate, and they had to leave early when Granddad had a sinking spell, brought on no doubt by the half bottle of Black Jack he’d consumed to get the energy to go in the first place.
So, while the other graduates threw their hats in the air and made goofy cheers, secure in the bosoms of their family’s love and pride, I had glared at the field in front of me, empty as it was of my own kith and kin, and sworn I would leave this town and never come back.
That night, Lonnie had snuck up behind me, grabbed me, spun me around, and kissed me. On the mouth. Our lips had parted, our tongues had flickered, he had fondled my breast and my butt. Then he’d let go of me and said, and I remember it as if I had written it down, “Baby, you’re the one that got away.”
Of course, later I’d heard he’d copped a feel and used the same line on several girls. But, hey, I was seventeen, and I floated off that football field, and went back to the emptiness of the house I shared with Farmer Dave and Brother Delvon, and I felt like a girl who had been wanted by the high school hotshot. The feeling didn’t last, but it had felt good for that hour or so it took me to pack everything I owned and hit the highway out of town. Gone was all I put on my note to Dave and Delvon.
All those years ago, I thought, and stared at Lonnie as he stared at me. Didn’t even recognize me, even with all of my letters to keep my name fresh in his mind.
“Why in damnation did you sell my grandmother’s house when you knew perfectly well I wanted it, and you had promised me you’d let me know—”
“Lilly Belle? Is that you?”
“You no-good, sorry S.O.B., liar, why—”
Lonnie grabbed me and kissed me, shutting me up in early rant. Like this stupid dream repeat, our lips parted, our tongues flickered, and he fondled my breast and my butt.
It took me a moment to regroup, but I did. I slapped him and went right back to yelling.
“Oh, baby, I always knew I’d regret letting you get away from me. You are the one that got away.”
The man was still using the same bull after twenty years? Okay, nobody said country-singers-turned-appliance-store-owners-and-county-commissioners had to be that smart, but really? It so stunned me I forgot to slap him again, or to yell at him.
Lonnie rubbed his face and grinned. “I’d heard you were back in town, and I’ve been meaning to come by, tell you how sorry I am about your momma.”
All said nicely, politician-salesman fake-sincere. I nodded on polite reflex, but I was not taken in.
“What are you doing here at Ray Glenn’s?” he asked.
“What are you doing here?”
“Looking. Figured it’d be up for sale, and it’ll be a good investment. This town is growing, and with that lake and the resort coming in, rich folks are going to start moving in, make us a golden retirement community, like Florida. Boom time, big land boom. Why there’s even plans for the Cherokees to put in a casino near that new lake. This place—hey, anybody tell you I’m a county commissioner now?”
“Yes, you, in every letter you wrote after you got elected and promised me you’d give me right of first refusal if you ever wanted to sell my grandmother’s place.”
“Come here and let me hug you again,” Lonnie said.
“You’re, you are…” I paused, trying to figure out how to approach this, but then I thought suddenly of Jubal and Hank as if they had been real clients. And I wondered if there was any turning Lonnie back, recanting his commission vote on this marina land-grab big-lake-development thing. “Have you thought about what your vote to join forces with that resort is doing to the citizens around that lake, people who voted for you? Any chance you’d change your mind?” Okay, yeah, spank me, totally lacking in subtlety or grace and manipulative ploys, but all that takes time and I wasn’t planning on camping out in Bugfest that long.
“Oh, Lilly Belle, that’s just business. You don’t want to get into that. Come on, let’s talk ole times. We had ’em, didn’t we?”
No, we hadn’t had any old times together, and having a country-boy nitwit dismiss me with “it’s just business” pushed a couple of buttons. In other words, I forgot Jubal and Hank’s problem in light of my own grievances. I launch
ed again at Lonnie, turncoat sexist that he was.
“I’m a partner in Sarasota’s biggest law firm [this is true], sonny, and I routinely handle high-end, complex business deals [this isn’t true, but made my point] that you couldn’t understand if I diagramed them in red highlighter [this would be true if I weren’t lying]. And furthermore, I could sue you for breach of a promissory contract.” This was blatantly bull, as there is no cause of action for a plain old-fashioned broken promise, but I didn’t figure Lonnie with his degree in failed prior enterprises was likely to know that, and I wanted him as upset as I was.
“Ain’t that a shame, you feeling that way about your grandmomma’s place,” Lonnie said. “But truth be told, Lilly Belle, I got an offer I couldn’t refuse.” And the idiot grinned big, like he was the first and only person to use that old cliché.
After that, Lonnie bent over backward apologizing, but never explained why he hadn’t contacted me to see if I could match the offer, the amount of which he was frustratingly vague about. I began to wind down. “What’s done is done” was something my grandmother had often said.
And, I mean, it wasn’t like I ever planned to live here again.
So, even knowing Lonnie wasn’t sincere in his apologies, I let him off the hook, and said, “What’s done is done.”
After all, I had bigger fish to catch and fry than this idiot.
chapter 18
There is something about not being in my own bed that means I can’t sleep.
Actually, I don’t sleep much in my own bed, but at least I know it’s an organic, clean bed. I sniffed my oldest nephew’s bed—it smelled like Tide. He was away at college, and I was glad I didn’t have to crash in a hotel, and I was glad of the Tide, as that meant the sheets had been recently washed, but I wondered what the mattress was made out of, and then I punched the pillows, which were big and puffy. Me, I like a flat pillow.
When I couldn’t make these pillows flat by pounding on them, I tried no pillows. But, in thirty seconds, my neck hurt.
Sweetheart Deal Page 11
