CINDERELLA BRIDE

by Monica McLean

  Carter strode across the room and flicked on the table lamp, casting a pool of light around the sitting area of his office. There sat two armchairs and a couch that had doubled as his bed for the past few months while he'd worked on the proposed acquisition of Southeastern Trust. Picking up a thick packet of notes, he folded his long frame onto the couch and reached for his reading glasses, pausing at the file just under the stack of yellow legal pads.

  Marly Alcott.

  He didn't need his glasses to see her name. Pinching the bridge of his nose, Carter drew a deep breath and shook his head. It wasn't until he'd sat down a year ago and formulated a plan, devised a spreadsheet listing his criteria, that he'd started to hope again, hope that he could have it all.

  Per his instructions, the P.I. had looked for possible candidates from three different career fields: nursing, social work and teaching. After that, Carter had assigned weights to each criterion and tabulated the results.

  Marly Alcott. The only woman with an X in every box:

  X Enjoys children

  X Understands poverty and what it takes to rise above it

  X Can be counted on, trusted not to manipulate

  X Needs what I have to offer

  X Plain-Jane looks

  He stopped reminiscing there and tossed the packet of notes over her file, but the image of her running away into the night wouldn't disappear as easily. He'd hoped that after some time—

  Carter shook his head. Who was he kidding? She wasn't going to call. Not this week and not the one after. Tonight, he would take his entire Cinderella Candidates file home and shred it. There would be no Cinderella bride. No bride at all. And no family.

  Not now.

  Not ever.

  Not for him.

  He'd thought long and hard in the car on the drive back from her house that night, entertaining the possibility that perhaps he'd attained all he was meant to attain, achieved all he was meant to achieve.

  Maybe he'd been greedy to want more when he'd already come so far. Maybe he was never meant to have the picture-perfect life he'd dreamed about all those years when he'd watched his classmates' parents pick them up every afternoon from their exclusive private school in the suburbs.

  He remembered how he would sit in the classroom window with his face pressed against the glass, watching and wishing. For long hours after all the kids had left, he would remain in the empty classroom and finish his homework, before helping Mama finish scrubbing the school toilets so they could catch the downtown bus home.

  How he'd envied those kids and their parents, the way they smelled good all the time and wore fancy clothes and drove expensive cars. Their perfect families. How he'd worked to be just like them. How many years had he driven himself to the point of exhaustion, trying to prove he could be as good if not better than them?

  "It doesn't matter, Carter. You can pretend to be something you're not, but you can't change who you are. No matter what, you're always going to be a white-trash boy from the projects who tempted fate and reaped rewards you weren't predetermined to sow."

  "Ah, Eva Ann. You always did have such a way with words." Carter's hand clenched into a tight fist as he pounded a rhythm on his thigh. Then he shook his head and smiled sardonically.

  He hated it when Eva Ann was right.

  * * *

  Nothing was going right.

  After three sleepless nights in a row, Marly forced herself to go to bed early, only to toss and turn yet again. She'd start to doze off, only to awaken again, her mind reeling with numbers.

  She'd stared at the ledgers too long and to no avail. No matter how she shuffled expenses or tried to cut costs, she still came up with deficits.

  Finally, she pulled on a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt and went outside to the garden. Crouching in the dirt, she admitted there was simply no way her center was going to survive at this rate.

  One more month, maybe two at most. By then, the reserves would be dry. She would have nothing left. No money to pay the teachers' salaries. No money for food to feed the kids.

  For the umpteenth time that week, she thought of Carter's proposal. Not the children he wanted her to bear, or how they would conceive those children, but the donation that would save her center, the money that could finance their operations for the next two years.

  Marly could use that time to apply for every federal grant out there, guarantee the solvency of her center and work on plans for expansion. It would work. She could do it. All she had to do was marry Carter King. And risk his finding out her deepest, darkest secret.

  She stopped pulling weeds for a minute and leaned back on her heels to weigh the consequences.

  She might have resigned herself long ago to the fact she would never have a family, never marry or have children, never be a wife or a mother. But it still hurt. Even now, years later. She could never let anyone get close enough to her, never risk someone discovering the terrible truth, the secret of her past.

  And yet, a small voice whispered that Carter was offering emotional detachment in their marriage—the emotional detachment she would need in a spouse—not to mention the chance to have children. Children of her own.

  She didn't know how long she'd been sitting in the garden, when a shuffling noise made her start. She peered over her shoulder, squinting at the back porch from where it came.

  The yellowish orange lamplight cast long shadows across the lawn, but nothing moved.

  Probably the wind.

  She drew a shaky breath, went to wipe her face with her hands, then thought better of it and used her shoulders.

  "Miss Marly?"

  She spun around at the sound of her name, instantly alert. Her gaze combed the porch, the lawn, the shrubbery.

  No one.

  She was hearing things—a definite sign that it was time to go in, crawl into bed and let exhaustion grant her reprieve from disparaging thoughts of the fate awaiting her.

  Straightening, Marly winced at her sore muscles and slowly climbed to her feet, then took off her dirty sneakers to walk sock-footed through the soft grass.

  "Miss Marly?" a tiny voice whispered.

  She froze, eyes widening. That was not the wind. She stared in the direction of the porch, took a cautious step forward, then paused to listen.

  Nothing.

  She took another step and stopped, straining to hear the slightest disturbance. She continued until she was within ten feet of the porch.

  "Miss Marly?" the voice came again, a stage whisper. "Are you there?"

  "Who said that?"

  "It's me. Tyler."

  Marly halted midstep. "Tyler?"

  "Yeah?"

  She glanced around. "Where are you?"

  "Under the porch."

  "Under the porch?" She ran to the small door on the side of the porch and unlatched it, then crouched to peer inside. "I can't see you."

  "I can't see you, either." His voice sounded dangerously near tears.

  She poked her head around, trying to figure out where his voice was coming from. "Tyler, sweetheart? Can you come out?"

  "No," he wailed. "I'm stuck."

  "Stuck?" Marly looked around nervously. "Uh, that's okay. Don't you worry. I'll, um, come in and get you." She slipped her sneakers back on. "What are you doing here anyway?"

  "Sleeping. I heard a noise, and it woke me up. I was hoping it was you."

  Marly took a deep breath. She'd learned that getting the desired answers out of her kids often required several attempts at rephrasing the question. First, she'd get him out. Then she'd figure out exactly how a five-year-old boy had managed to end up a mile from home—let alone in the crawl space underneath the porch—at ten o'clock at night.

  "Tyler, sweetie? Can you keep talking to me so I can follow your voice?"

  "Yeah." Silence. "What do you want me to say?"

  "Anything. Just keep talking so I can hear you." Marly squinted into the dark storage space. Then she pulled back and stood up, wondering if she shouldn'
t run and get a flashlight. Not that she'd ever seen one at Annie Lou's before. She might have to wake her. What if she didn't have one? Everyone had them, no?

  "I gotta go pee real bad."

  Okay. She wiped her palms against her thighs. Forget the flashlight. "Hang on. I'm coming." She fell to her knees, ducked her head and started crawling on the ground in the direction of his voice. "Can you hold it?"

  "Yeah, but not very long."

  She turned right, and bumped into what felt like a garden hose. "Ouch."

  "Careful. There's lots of stuff in here."

  "Thanks for the warning, kiddo." Marly groped in the dark with one hand to avoid colliding with anything else. She hoped that once she found Tyler she could then finesse her way back out again. She looked over her shoulder. Yes, it would be okay. The light from the door would guide her back. "Tyler? Why don't you sing your ABCs for me."

  "'Kay. Which way? Funny or regular?" His voice was getting closer.

  "How about funny?"

  "'Kay." Tyler plugged his nose and started a nasal rendition of the alphabet.

  Marly inched her way forward, winding around barriers and shoving things out of her path.

  "Miss Marly—" He broke off, still holding his nose.

  "Yes, Tyler?"

  "I don't think you talk like this." The kids often teased about her northern accent, trying to mimic her by plugging their noses.

  "Thanks, Tyler. I appreciate that."

  "You're welcome. Want me to keep singing?"

  "Yes, please."

  "The funny way?"

  "Anyway you want."

  "'Kay. I'm gonna do regular now."

  He wasn't more than a few feet in front of her now. She reached out and found the fabric of his shirt. "Gotcha!"

  Getting out proved easier than getting in, with the light outside the door as a beacon. Once inside the house, Marly let Tyler tend to his call of nature before she started questioning him.

  "All done?" she asked as he came out of the powder room off the kitchen.

  Tyler nodded, rubbing his eyes before he held his arms out to her.

  She leaned down and scooped the boy up in her arms, grimacing at his weight. "Whoa. You're getting to be awfully big. Pretty soon I'm not going to be able to do this."

  And pretty soon she would mourn the loss of a three-year ritual. She had carried him for a few minutes almost every day during that time, ever since he'd first come to her center. His separation anxiety from his mother had decreased considerably since the beginning, but he still continued to be love-starved whenever he grew tired, usually first thing in the morning and later in the evening.

  So she would hold him for a while as they stood in the window and waved to the other children arriving in the mornings, and she'd cuddle with him a bit in the evenings before his mother came to pick him up. Sometimes, if it got too late, Marly brought him home with her. If the weather was nice, they would walk down to the Circle K and get ice cream cones to eat on the front porch while they waited.

  Tyler's mother wasn't usually late, but when she was, Marly always worried that the woman had had a relapse. She'd been struggling alone with her drug problem, refusing to check into a detox clinic, but as far as Marly could tell, she'd been clean for several months now. She'd held down her job as a dancer in a men's nightclub for almost a year, and that was a step in the right direction. Getting out of her marriage to Billy Ray had proved the best thing she'd ever done. For herself and for Tyler.

  If only the center could get funding for the workshops Marly wanted. Workshops that would address the special needs of these parents. Dealing with stress. Staying clean from drugs. Keeping a job. Parenting skills.

  "So how about you tell me how you got here tonight?" she asked, trying to concentrate on the here and now.

  "Mrs. Barton," Tyler said, his voice already thick with impending sleep.

  "Mrs. Barton?"

  "Umm-hmm."

  "Who is Mrs. Barton?"

  "A lady. She's got two dogs, and one of them—the one with the black spots—just had puppies. Do you like puppies?"

  Marly nodded, gnawing her lower lip. She could see getting answers out of Tyler tonight was going to be darn near next to impossible.

  She closed her eyes, feeling suddenly overwhelmed. Darn near next to impossible. Carter had used that phrase the other night.

  "All right, Tyler. We'll figure it out later. But for now, I think we'd better get you home before you fall asleep on me."

  "'Kay," Tyler answered in a voice that indicated he was halfway there.

  She shifted his weight on her hip and reached for the phone to call Linda Cameron. The phone rang once, twice, three times.

  Marly looked at the clock above the stove. Ten-thirty. Could Linda have gone out, possibly looking for Tyler?

  Four, five, six. The phone continued to ring. Then, on the ninth ring, someone picked up the receiver.

  "Hello? Linda?" Marly twisted the phone cord in frustration at the dead air on the other end. "Is anyone there? Linda, can you hear me? It's Marly Alcott from Little Learners."

  There was no answer. But Marly heard a resounding click as the line disconnected. Strange. She hung up and dialed again, only to get a busy signal. Was Linda frantic, calling all the neighbors to find her son? Marly hung up and tried one more time. Busy again. Tyler had already fallen asleep.

  She gave a deep sigh. Maybe she'd just keep him overnight. She could run by his apartment and let Linda know, leave a note if she wasn't there.

  She took him downstairs to her room. His blond hair felt soft on her shoulder, and she smiled wistfully, holding him a bit closer before she tucked him in bed. Then she padded back upstairs, woke Annie Lou and asked her to keep an ear out.

  "I have to run over to the Bricks," she explained, giving the nickname for the low-income community where Tyler and his mother lived.

  "Be careful," Annie Lou admonished.

  "I will." Marly knew the neighborhood well. She'd distributed flyers there in the past. Even though it wasn't reputed to be the most dangerous of the area projects—that honor went to Morrene Gardens, right down the street—she still didn't cherish the idea of venturing out there after dark. Alone.

  But Tyler's mother would undoubtedly be worried, and Marly had to let her know that her son was safe.

  It took her all of five minutes to drive over and another five to locate Linda's apartment. Because the all-brick buildings looked identical, she ended up parking in front of the wrong one.

  Even before she left her car, she heard the noises. People fighting, babies crying, children shrieking. She recalled one of the mothers who lived in Bricks said she'd occasionally wished she were deaf so the ruckus wouldn't drive her insane. Now, with the bass from someone's music pummeling an aggravating rhythm into her head, Marly could certainly relate.

  She ran to the adjacent building, keeping her head down all the way. The pounding seemed to increase once she was inside. She braced herself and climbed three flights of stairs, two steps at a time. The sound grew with every flight, until she stood in front of their apartment door. Finding it slightly ajar, she pushed open the door.

  The dingy apartment smelled like a fraternity house after a party, the stench of stale beer and urine hanging in the air. A two-inch cockroach accepted the invitation to go outside, scrambling past Marly's feet and into the hallway. She grimaced and held her breath, taking a hesitant step inside as she searched for some evidence of Linda Cameron.

  Tyler's security blanket lay on a worn director's chair beside the stereo. It had been nicknamed "Ratty Blanket" because it looked as though it had been dragged down every dirty street in the Bricks. No amount of washing would ever turn the tattered, brown rag back into what was once a yellow blanket. Instinctively, Marly reached for Tyler's prized possession and folded it under her arm.

  She opened her mouth to call out for Linda, then mechanically closed it without uttering a sound. How would anyone hear her above the blast of
music? The vibration of the bass even shook the floor. But when she reached for the knob of the stereo to turn it down, she faltered midmotion, her senses ramming into full alert.

  It had been years since she'd had the sensation, but she recognized the tingling all at once. Starting at the base of her spine, it slowly worked its way up until the small hairs on the back of her neck stood in rigid attention.

  Something was wrong. Very wrong. Deadly wrong.

  She looked toward the bedroom, took a hesitant step forward, then whirled toward the kitchen without knowing why. A swift avalanche of cold, black fear seized the air from her lungs as her gaze collided with Linda Cameron.

  The woman was lying on the kitchen floor in a pool of blood, a knife sticking out of her body. Above her, the crouched, still form was unmistakable.

  Billy Ray Cameron.

  * * *

  Chapter 5

  « ^ »

  Shock held Marly paralyzed in its asphyxiating grip.

  Billy Ray's long, thin ponytail hung down his back. She caught a glimpse of his craggy face in profile. If he so much as raised his gaze, she'd fall within his peripheral vision.

  Run! her mind screamed, but her legs wouldn't respond. With sickening horror, she watched Billy Ray pull the knife out of his ex-wife's body, his lips twisting with the effort.

  Get the hell out of here! Still, she couldn't move. He rose and crossed to a kitchen drawer, the knife dripping in his wake. He extracted a dishcloth and proceeded to wipe off the murder weapon like a prized possession.

  He's killed her! a voice cried out in her mind, banishing the vestiges of doubt. And he'll kill you, too, if he turns around and sees you standing there!

  Suddenly, Billy Ray's shoulders straightened. He lifted his head a fraction of an inch, like a wild animal sniffing its prey.

  Panic slapped her then. Marly whirled and bolted for the door.

  "Oh, God," she sobbed, half running, half stumbling down three flights of stairs, looking behind her all the way. Had he turned around and seen her? Was he following her?

  Tears blurred her vision as she ran from the building. Her car appeared in the distance, parked in front of the wrong building. Too far away. She wouldn't make it. He would see her running, catch up to her. No. She had to get away. Hide.