by Annie Jones
“Eat your brownie. The guilt will pass.”
“Oh, I didn’t mean you two.” Bernadette spread her hands out. “In fact, I would like to make a gift of those tiaras you both admired and modeled so, um…distinctively. It’s my way of saying thank-you for all you’ve done.”
“All we’ve done? Like what?” I covered my eyes with my hand, my head down. “Closing down your business? Embarrassing Jan in front of everyone?”
“You didn’t embarrass me, I embarrassed myself.” Jan spoke in a voice that was hushed and hoarse with emotion. “Big time. And I deserved everything I got, too.”
“No, I don’t believe that,” I murmured.
“I deserved everything I brought on myself,” she corrected. “As for the rest of it…”
She didn’t have to say the rest of what. We all knew she meant Morty and Helen and the problems in her marriage.
“As for the rest of it…I won’t say I’m not angry and hurt, but…I’ve known that man since I was a kid, really. I have loved him and lived with him and fought with him and failed with him and I am not ready to let go of him.” She began to weep softly. So softly that a passerby who could not see the tears on her cheeks might not have known it at all except for the subtle shake of her shoulders and the catch in her breath. “We’re seeking counseling. We are going to try to work through it.”
I opened my arms to her without thinking. I just…I just wanted to draw her close and let her know how very sorry I was about everything that had happened and how much I cared for her. “I will pray for you every day, my friend.”
“Thank you,” she whispered. “It’s been so long since I felt that anyone was on my side. You don’t know what it means.”
But I did. In that split second, I knew exactly what it meant. I knew then why I had so cherished my friendship with Maxine. It wasn’t because we shared a love of bacon, or a common background, or even because we both wanted to collect the entire set of Royal Service partyware, the Hostess Queen pattern. It was because, after too many years of being the minister’s wife, of often having to raise our children on our own, of knowing anything we said or did or got photographed and stuck in the paper wearing would be subject to scrutiny. In a life where we felt like the people we cared for the most could, in an instant, turn against us, we had found someone to be on our side. No matter what.
And that was what, in the end, we had given Jan. And…I turned and looked at my Bernadette, who was aglow with a new kind of confidence. We had been on her side, too, when the people she had done so much for not only pushed her out of the way but wanted to keep her out of the running. For anything worth running for.
And then there was Chloe. I don’t think anyone had ever been on her side. Sammy, maybe. Or maybe he had charmed her into thinking so, for his own reasons. That might have been why she felt the need to protect him. He was the one she thought would stand by her, even when she did not think she deserved it.
I blinked and suddenly realized my eyes were damp.
“Take the tiara, Odessa.” Bernadette slid the key into the lock and turned it with a firm click.
“Only if you will let us pay for them,” Maxine insisted. “Full price.”
“For you.” Bernadette pulled free the larger of two and handed it across the glass.
“You should wear it, Odessa,” Maxine took it from Bernadette’s long fingers and gently placed it on my head, careful not to flatten out my hairdo. “It looks so darling on you.”
“And for you.” Bernadette brought out the second one and held it out to Maxine.
She slipped it on and asked me how it looked.
“Like it’s finally where it belongs,” I said, though I couldn’t resist adjusting it a teeny bit.
“Oh, look, the tiara ladies are back again!” someone called from down the aisle.
I looked up and found Chloe laughing and giving us a thumbs-up. My little lamb, with just a hint of air in her hair. My heart swelled. Jesus said, only not in these words, it is always too soon to give up on someone.
“I have some fliers.” Bernadette pulled some pink and white papers from the briefcase she had leaning against one of the chairs in her booth. “If you two want to help out, you certainly would be perfect to walk through the place handing them out.”
“Or maybe we could go and stand at the gate,” I suggested.
Maxine took the papers and began to follow me. “Odessa, what do you have in mind?”
“If you can’t beat them, charm them.” I gave a regal wave to the curious onlookers and marched with purpose straight ahead. “We are going to go talk to Sammy Wilson.”
Jan had said it: Either I’m a woman of faith and conviction, who relies on the Lord for her hope and strength, or I’m a big fat phony.
And a big fat phony did not deserve tiaras or to have so many good women on her side. I still didn’t know if I had anything worth saying, but I knew a message that was worth sharing with a young man who had gone astray. And I didn’t see why a woman who still had a little fire in her shouldn’t be the one to share it with him.
Chapter Seventeen
So that was that. We had made a difference, and we had the new compassionate Jan, the new confident Bernadette and the new cleaned-up Chloe to show for it. Now, if we could just get the men in their lives sorted out, all would be well.
“Not another project for us, Odessa!”
“Maxine, do I have to point out to you that that minister is still single?”
“Oh, no. That won’t do.”
“And we still think that Sammy might be bullying our girl.”
“And that won’t do times two.”
“Times two?”
“Me and you, Odessa.”
“We’ll just have to set our minds to sorting out Sammy and if we can’t do that, then to getting Miss Chloe Morgan—”
“Excuse me, did you say Chloe Morgan?”
It was that redheaded lady police officer with the ponytail who interrupted Maxine interrupting me. She had a no-nonsense look to her, she was clearly asking in an official capacity, and she was armed, so I decided not to take issue with her bad manners.
“Yes.” I didn’t say anything else.
Maxine, whose winning smile had suddenly lost its luster, raised an eyebrow at me.
I knew what she was asking in that sly, silent way of hers.
“For once in my life, I decided not to volunteer too much,”
I whispered.
“Somebody get me a chair.” She placed the back of her hand against her forehead in one of the worst displays of acting I’d seen in quite a while, and remember, as a minister’s wife I have overseen hundred of Christmas plays and youth rally skit nights. “I think I might faint.”
We had reached the gate and begun eyeballing our boy Sammy when the woman intruded on our conversation.
“Yes, Officer…” I lowered my head to read the name on her tag. “Officer Phife.”
“Really?” Maxine asked, and she, too, checked the name tag.
“Bet you get a lot of jokes about that,” I said.
She frowned. “Why?”
I shut my eyes.
Maxine sighed.
Old enough for the state of Texas to entrust her with upholding the law, but too young to know about Deputy Barney Fife from The Andy Griffith Show. It made me feel positively ancient.
“I wondered, since you seemed to know Chloe Morgan, if you could tell me if she is working at her usual booth today?” The young woman motioned toward the open gate.
“Is she in trouble?” Maxine took a step toward that gate.
“I’ll just go look for her.” The officer turned away.
Suddenly I felt real helpful. “We can take you right to her.”
“That won’t be necessary. Please.” She said “Please,” but she held up her hand in a way that said No thank you.
“She doesn’t want us to tag along,” Maxine muttered in my ear. Then she stuck a broad grin on her face and gave th
e woman a wave. “Okay then. You do that.”
I waved, too, wondering what she must have thought of the pair of us standing there grinning like fools in nurses’ shoes, jersey dresses, windproof puffy hairdos and tiaras. I didn’t let myself linger overlong on the matter, as I had other issues to deal with. Still waving, I put my head practically on Maxine’s shoulder and whispered my plan. “We’ll count to ten after she gets out of sight, then make a beeline for Chloe’s booth anyway.”
Maxine slapped me on the back—not like fellows do, not a great big wallop, but more a warm tap to show her support. “You are in a much saucier mood then when we came through here a little bit ago.”
“When we walked through here a little bit ago, I thought it was the last time.”
“The last—?”
“That’s what I told David when I left. That I wouldn’t even have come out today, if not for Bernadette closing out and all.”
“And what did he say?’
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Yes. He just lowered his paper and looked at me. Sort of funny-like, too.”
“What did you do?”
“What could I do?” Stand there and listen to him tell me how much I’ve changed? Or wait out a lecture on what happened last time I came to the flea market, what people expect of his wife and family and how much I’ve changed? Or, worst of all, have him shake his head and say something that made it perfectly clear he hadn’t heard a word I’d said? “I gave him a kiss and hurried off. I was already late getting off to pick you up.”
“Well, I didn’t tell my husband that this might be my last time out here. But I suppose if that’s what you decide, then maybe…maybe we can think of some other place to go to…”
I raised my hand. “Okay, I just lost track of that police officer, Maxine. Start counting.”
“Me, count? What are you going to do?”
I glanced at the handouts Bernadette had asked us to distribute.
“One.”
Then I scanned the crowd for any sign of Sammy.
“Two.”
He helped a young couple into the balloon. Then, as it rose into the air, with the ruddy-faced owner in the basket and at the controls, he twisted around and caught my eye.
“Three.”
He raised his hand, checked the situation overhead, then took a step our way. “Hey, Mrs. Pepperdine, Mrs. Cooke-Nash! What was up with the police lady?”
“Four.”
“She was asking after Chloe.” Well, I had come out here to discuss the girl with him, why not jump right into the matter?
“Chloe?” He stopped in his tracks.
“Five.”
“What did she want to know about Chloe for?” I couldn’t actually see him sweat, but he did fidget.
Now, this boy is a cool one. Most charmers are. They don’t like to let anyone see them sweat…or squirm…or fidget. So right away I had a powerfully bad feeling in the pit of my stomach about what might really be going on here with our balloon ballyhooer, our local law enforcement and our Chloe.
“Six.” Maxine went right on, as if she’d taken no notice of Sammy standing there asking questions, but her eyes shifted to catch my gaze and she frowned to show she didn’t like the way this was going. “Seven.”
“I…uh…” Eyes on the gate where the officer had disappeared, Sammy took one step backward, and then another. Then he stumbled, not over one of the many rocks or ruts or into one of the puddles that always seemed to muck up the entryway, but over a pair of shabby, scuffed shoes.
I would have known those feet anywhere. “Reverend Cordell, what brings you out to the Five Acres of Fabulous Finds?”
“I came to lend a little support to Bernadette on her last weekend here.”
“Oh?” I waggled my eyebrows at Maxine.
“Eight!” she said, giving me a thumbs-up.
I opened my mouth to tell her that she didn’t have to keep counting, but before I could make a noise, something slammed straight into me and knocked the breath clean out of me.
“Chloe!” Jake reached out to help the girl up where she had fallen. “Are you okay?”
He didn’t ask me if I was okay. But then, I was still on both feet. The only damage I seemed to have sustained was that my tiara had gotten knocked crooked. Of course, his lack of concern did ding my pride a bit, which was why I didn’t rush to straighten myself out, you know, just so everyone could see that even though I was the classic immovable object to Chloe’s irresistible—meaning she was moving at an out-of-control speed, not that she was tempting beyond all ability to withstand—force, I hadn’t gotten off unscathed.
“Nine.”
“You can stop counting now, Maxine,” I finally said.
She held up both hands, her fingers splayed.
“Yes, I get it. Ha, ha. You’re not saying it. But you have to have the last word.” I held up my ten fingers to mirror hers. “You can be so stubborn sometimes, you know that?”
“I know that Officer Phife is running this way and she is undoing the strap on her stun gun.”
I turned, my hands still raised, and gasped.
Jake straightened up, still holding Chloe by the wrist.
Sammy hurried back to the balloon and began calling something up to his boss. I could not hear what it was over the whoosh of the flames that heated the air in the balloon.
Chloe tugged herself free from Jake’s grasp and struggled to find a clear path away from us through the gathering crowd.
“Stay where you are, Ms. Morgan,” Officer Phife called out, but she didn’t unharness her nonlethal weapon.
“It’s all right, Chloe.” Jake only had to extend his long arm to contain the petite Chloe.
She put her hands on his sleeve, as if she might push him away, then stopped and turned around.
“Sir, if you could just step away from Ms. Morgan.” The officer came up to them then, but made no threatening moves.
“I’d like to stay close, if you don’t mind,” he said.
The officer crossed her arms and raised her head. “It’s not really your concern.”
“I think it is my concern. I’m Chloe’s—”
“What’s going on?” Bernadette arrived on the scene breathless, her thick hair mussed and falling over her face. “Officer Phife walked up, and Chloe just cut and ran.”
Maxine threw her hands up in the air, then brought them down against her thighs with a sharp smack.
“My thoughts exactly,” I said softly. The girl might have a feeling for other people’s feelings, but she was clueless when it came to timing. If she had waited just ten seconds longer, we would have learned the end of that sentence. I’m Chloe’s…what, exactly?
The redheaded lady in the brown uniform opened her arms wide. “Nothing to see, folks.”
“Nothing to see?” Maxine made a point of looking at all there was to see around us, starting with my whomper-jawed tiara. “Is she kidding?”
“Move along, please.” Officer Phife waved her hands in the air, the way you see people do to shoo away pigeons.
All the people pretty much stayed put.
“Chloe, whatever is going on, I won’t leave you to face it alone,” Jake said.
Unlike Jake, Sammy had entirely retreated from the girl. Granted, he had work to do, hauling the basket down to the ground again and helping the occupants out. Even as he directed the couple exiting the balloon area to watch their steps, he kept his eyes on Chloe and the police officer.
“I just want to ask you a few questions is all, ma’am,” Officer Phife nodded toward the parking lot.
Jake inched forward.
But it was Bernadette who spoke up. “Is she under arrest?”
“I didn’t do it!” Chloe flung her arms out, her lips pale and trembling.
My stomach knotted. “Do what, sweetie?”
She spun around to face me, and all the fight seemed to drain right out of her. “One time. I did swipe some cards one ti
me. But you saw me and I got scared and couldn’t go through with it. Y’all have been so nice to me, and done so much, and when you said you saw me steal those numbers…”
“Steal?” She might as well have said it in Latin. There was just no context for the idea of our Chloe stealing anything, and I had no understanding of how or why anyone would steal numbers. “Numbers?”
“Credit card numbers,” Bernadette murmured.
“Like Helen Davenport’s,” Jake said. “It’s a scam. A con. And the flea market is the perfect place for it, because different people come every week. No one notices if a new seller pops up or an old one drops out.”
The officer did not confirm or deny. “Please, sir, leave this for the police.”
“This is Sammy’s doing.” I looked to Maxine, then Bernadette, then Jake, for support of my theory—and got it. Chloe would not meet my eyes, another kind of evidence of the truth of my accusation. “He’s the one behind the whole thing.”
“Pardon me, ma’am—you believe you know who’s running the identity-theft ring?”
“It wasn’t identity theft,” Chloe protested. Cheeks red and voice strained, she spoke to each of us in turn. “Sammy said it was just small stuff. They did it for kicks, because it was so boring to work out here. They just get the numbers and charge a little bit here and there. It was so small that people didn’t even notice it and paid it anyway. Or if they did notice, they called the card company and they took care of it. No big deal. Sammy said if they didn’t care, why should we?”
I didn’t know what broke my heart more, the desperate sincerity in the girl’s justification or that she was still defending that rat Sammy. “It was the young man who worked at the balloon ride.” I turned to where the young man had stood not thirty seconds earlier. “His name is Sammy Wilson and he…”
And he was gone.
“Not to pull out the old cliché—” a man in the crowd tapped Officer Phife on the shoulder and pointed through the gate and the sprawling marketplace beyond “—but he went thataway.”
Officer Phife turned slowly. Her once-determined expression faded. Her shoulders slumped. “Five acres loaded with people and clutter and stuff.”
