“Been here six years,” Max said.
He was going to be difficult to get information out of, she could tell.
“And what brought you here?”
“Layla.”
Sadie looked up at that, her hands pausing in the process of unwrapping the plastic from the cheese slice. “Oh,” she said in surprise. That wasn’t what she’d expected him to say. “Layla?”
“Tia got a job to take care of her,” Max said. “So we moved.”
“I see,” Sadie said, returning to her sandwich-making duties while they talked. “And how does their arrangement work? She gets paid to take care of Layla?”
“Yeah.”
“And who pays her?”
“Larry.”
“Oh,” Sadie said for the second time. She was doing a lousy job of concealing her surprise at his answers, but she didn’t think Max noticed or even cared. “Larry pays Tia to take care of Layla?” And he paid the expenses for Layla’s house? Sadie had never heard of such a generous ex-husband. She felt the familiar threads of suspicion begin creeping their way into her mind. She’d told Eric that in order to get to the bottom of things, there had to be suspects. She may have just found one.
Max nodded and drank more Dr. Pepper.
“And do you work as well?” Sadie asked while opening the bologna package.
Max looked at the table and shook his head. “Hurt my back.”
Sadie gave him a sympathetic smile. At least there was a reason he lounged around on his porch all day. Poor guy.
She laid the bologna on top of the cheese and lifted the jar of mayonnaise. “Mayo?”
“That’s remoulade.”
Hearing Max speak French took her by yet another surprise. He’d even pronounced it right: ray-moo-lahd. Impressive. She looked back at the jar, which said mayonnaise quite prominently. But as she looked closer, she could see that it had a bit of a pink tint with some spices mixed in. Did that mean it was homemade remoulade that had been put back into the mayonnaise jar?
Sadie couldn’t help herself, the mere thought of homemade remoulade took hold. She opened the jar and took a finger swipe. She put it in her mouth and groaned out loud as the creamy spiced mixture filled her mouth with all the flavors the South was famous for. She closed her eyes to give the creation proper respect. After a few more moments, she opened her eyes to see Max watching her strangely. “It’s delicious,” she said, almost sighing. “Did Tia make this?”
Max nodded.
“It’s amazing,” she said. The flavor reminded her of something, but it took her a moment to make the connection. “Coleslaw!”
Chapter 34
Uh, what?” Max asked.
Sadie could barely contain her excitement as she went back to the fridge and pulled out the head of cabbage. May Tia forgive me if I’m ruining her dinner plans. Within thirty seconds, she’d found a chef’s knife and a cutting board and was slicing through the head of cabbage.
“What are you doing?” Max asked.
Sadie glanced up at him before looking back at the cabbage. She was a fast chopper—top of her class in home-ec back in high school—and didn’t want to accidentally cut off her finger. “See, I’m from Colorado,” Sadie explained, using the knife to push the already sliced cabbage to the side so she could continue chopping. “And we don’t have much Southern food there. But there’s this little Cajun place in Fort Collins, and they have the most amazing coleslaw I’ve ever had in my life. It’s spicy like this remoulade. And so I can’t help but wonder if I combined the remoulade with the cabbage, if that might be how they make their coleslaw. I mean, it’s a unique flavor so I assumed it was complicated and specific, but you guys use remoulade for lots of things down here, right?” She looked up long enough to see him nod before keeping her eyes on her fingers again. “Right, that’s what I thought.”
She shook her head and muttered under her breath, “Genius.”
With the cabbage shredded, Sadie banged through a couple of cupboards before she found a bowl large enough to hold the cabbage. Then she found a big spoon and scooped some of the remoulade into the bowl before using that same spoon to toss the ingredients together. She may have used too much sauce, which could have used a little thinning, but she kept stirring to coat the cabbage, and within a couple of minutes, she had what looked like the very coleslaw she’d been craving.
“Do you want some?” she asked Max as she pulled a couple of bowls out of the cupboard.
“Sure,” he said, but he continued to watch her carefully, as though she might burst into flames at any moment. “Do I still get a sandwich?”
Oh, yes, the sandwich. That was why she’d come in here, wasn’t it? “Of course,” Sadie said, smiling as she scooped some coleslaw on a plate and took it to him with a fork. On her way back to the counter, she turned around to face him. “Have you ever used remoulade on your sandwich in place of mayo?”
“That’s how Tia always makes it.”
Which explained why it was in the mayo jar in the first place. Sadie liked how this woman thought.
Before she dug into her own bowl of slaw, she finished making his sandwich. Tomatoes and lettuce, and maybe a few caramelized onions, would have made it nearly perfect, but she’d done the best she could. She took the plate to Max and then returned to her food.
“Mmm,” she heard herself say as she took the first bite. This was it—Cajun coleslaw: cabbage and remoulade. She’d figured it out! In her mind a heavenly choir began singing.
She just loved food.
“Do you like it?” Sadie asked as she dished herself up another bowl a minute later.
“It’s good,” Max said. He was alternating between bites of the sandwich and bites of the coleslaw. Sadie figured he probably wasn’t the type to gush over the discovery of a recipe so she just smiled and took his compliment as simply that, a compliment.
It wasn’t until Sadie was nearing the bottom of her second bowl that she remembered that Cajun coleslaw wasn’t her reason for having come over here. As soon as she remembered that, everything else came flooding back: Mathews, Megan, Eric. Food was so distracting sometimes. She busied herself with cleaning up the mess she’d made, even reluctantly putting plastic wrap over the Cajun coleslaw and returning it to the fridge. She wished she could take it with her.
“So,” she said as she wiped down the counters, invigorated by her success. “We were talking about what you saw this morning after Layla and I left. Have you had some time to think about that?”
Max stared into his coleslaw bowl while Sadie patiently waited for him to answer. After nearly a full minute, she worried he wasn’t going to answer at all. If food hadn’t done it, what would help him open up?
A few seconds later, Max stood and carried his dishes to the sink. “Thank you for the sandwich,” he said, then opened the fridge for another can of Dr. Pepper and headed out of the kitchen.
Sadie let out a huff as the screen door slammed. She was losing her touch if someone like Max—nice enough, but not necessarily sophisticated—didn’t give her what she wanted. She rinsed the dishes, left them in the sink, and then headed toward the front door, wondering if maybe cold, hard cash would make a difference.
On her way to the porch, she glanced around the small living room again, giving it more attention than she had on her way in. There were two recliners facing the TV and a small table between them. Sadie moved toward the table and picked up a silver paperweight in the shape of a three-dimensional star. As she expected, it was heavy for its size, and as Sadie turned it in her hand, she read the words engraved on the front: “Thank you for being one of our service stars.” Beneath it in smaller letters were the words, “Lighthouse Rescue Mission.” What a nice gift, Sadie thought, putting it back.
As she turned toward the door, she saw a frame on the wall between the door and the window. There were several cutouts in the matte board, allowing more than one photo to be displayed within a single frame. She took a few steps closer and looked
for a picture of who must be Tia. She found one of a large woman who had a round face like Max and a smile so big and so proud that Sadie couldn’t help but smile back. She was standing next to two boys in wheelchairs, each of them holding up a medal. The next photo was a younger, thinner Max in high school graduation regalia. He wasn’t smiling, but he looked pleased all the same. There was a picture of Tia hugging an elderly woman, and then Sadie’s eyes stopped on a photo of Tia, Max, Layla, and a teenaged Megan.
Tia stood between Max and Megan, her arms thrown around their shoulders. Layla stood a little apart from the other three, looking like a deer in the headlights, her expression flat, her eyes staring straight ahead. Everyone was looking at the camera, except Megan who, instead, had turned her head to smile at her mother. Sadie looked between mother and daughter. What had their relationship been like? If Sadie could base her judgment solely on this photo, she would have said that Megan was completely comfortable with Layla, perhaps even trying to encourage her to smile for the picture. It was very sweet.
Sadie took a closer look at Tia, ticking off the details she knew about the woman. Tia was good cook, a caretaker for both Max and Layla, and, by the looks of the photos and the thank-you paperweight, an avid volunteer. Good for her.
Sadie took another look at the picture with Megan in it and wondered if Eric had ever seen it. Then her stomach flipped; by now he was with his daughter. It was surreal to think about, and she hoped that, despite the things she’d learned from Joe, their reunion would be a happy one. She wondered if it was too soon to call Eric and ask for a report.
She put her hand out to push open the screen door and looked across the street at Layla’s house. There was a perfect line of sight from where she stood to Layla’s front door, obstructed only by Sadie’s car parked on the street. Sadie could see into Layla’s front door and thought she could see someone coming toward the door. Thinking it might be the owner of the silver Acura, she paused and took a step back from the door in the hopes of simply putting her curiosity to rest. The afternoon sun was moving behind the house, casting Max’s front porch in shadow, which she hoped would conceal her.
A moment later Layla’s screen door opened, but it wasn’t Layla who exited. Instead, Larry headed down the steps, his right hand holding his phone to his ear. Hadn’t he said he had to work? He was quite animated in his conversation, and Sadie watched as he went to the Acura, pulled keys out of his pocket and pushed the button that unlocked the car. But he didn’t open the driver’s side door. Instead, he popped the trunk and, a few seconds later, pulled out a cardboard box big enough to hold reams of paper. It even had the Staples logo on the side. He lifted it with only one arm, which meant it couldn’t be full of paper—paper was too heavy.
Larry didn’t head back to Layla’s house. Instead he shot a cursory glance in both directions and took long strides across the street while still talking on the phone.
He was coming to Max and Tia’s house.
Sadie looked around wildly for somewhere to hide, but the living room furniture was basic and sparse. She did the only thing she could think to do and jumped to the side of the door, pressing her back against the wall just to the side of it and trying not to knock the picture frame to the floor.
It was a good position for Sadie to have chosen because, as Larry got closer, she could hear his end of the phone conversation. Not that it did her any good; he was speaking Spanish. She picked up a few words though—tomorrow and iron . . . or was it mistake? They were very similar in Spanish. Sadie’s breathing became more and more shallow the closer Larry came to the house, and she realized that while her position supported eavesdropping quite well, it wasn’t at all optimal should he decide to come inside.
She heard a few hurried words in Spanish, and then Larry said, “Hey Max, how’d things go?”
“Fine,” Max said with all the luster he’d used when he’d spoken to Sadie.
“Good.”
Sadie listened to the sound of shuffling paper—money maybe?
“Here you go,” Larry said. “Did the police ask you about having a key?”
“Yeah,” Max said simply. “I said I did, and they went away.”
Key? Sadie nearly gasped out loud. Had Max broken into Layla’s house and burned the box? If he had a key, the police wouldn’t suspect he’d break in. And Larry put him up to it?
Larry interrupted her thoughts. “Tia’s going to take care of this for me,” he said. Was he talking about the paper box he’d brought from the car? “Can I put them inside?”
Sadie’s heart froze, and she found herself looking around the room again just in case a good hiding place had become available in the last twenty seconds. There were no curtains to hide behind, no large furniture other than an entertainment center, but it was pushed up against the wall. She looked longingly across the doorway at the space behind the front door. If only she’d thought to hide there, she might have had a chance. She heard the screen door creak open and inched herself to the side, pressing against the wall even more while clenching her eyes shut and preparing for a very awkward conversation.
“You can leave that out here,” Max said.
Sadie’s eyes shot open. She looked at the shoe-clad foot poised on the threshold.
“You sure?” Larry said. “I don’t mind taking it into the office.”
“I’ll take it,” Max said.
Oh, bless you, Max, Sadie thought, but she still didn’t breathe.
“Well, all right then,” Larry said, letting the door shut. Sadie heard him put something down on the porch. “Tell Tia I’ll call her later. Thanks.”
Max didn’t reply, but Larry’s voice immediately picked up in Spanish again—had he not ended his phone call from before? Sadie could hear him getting farther away.
Sadie stayed pressed against the wall until she heard the car engine start and then fade away. Only then did she turn and push open the door a few inches. “Thank you, Max,” she whispered.
He took a sip of his soda while he stared at Layla’s house. He didn’t say anything.
“Why’d you do it?”
“He said he was leaving.”
Sadie pulled her eyebrows together. “Larry said he was leaving?” she repeated. She hadn’t heard him say that—he’d just left.
“He said if I’d get rid of the big box, he’d leave.”
“You mean he’d leave Homestead?”
“Leave Layla.”
Cajun Coleslaw
2 teaspoons sugar
1 cup remoulade
1 (14-ounce) bag coleslaw blend (or equal amounts of green and purple cabbage, sliced thin)
Mix sugar and remoulade. Add coleslaw mix and stir until cabbage is well-coated. Refrigerate until serving.
Remoulade
2 cups mayonnaise
3 tablespoons ketchup
2 tablespoons Creole, Cajun, or deli-style mustard (not yellow)
1 tablespoon fresh parsley, chopped
1 tablespoon lemon juice, freshly squeezed
2 teaspoons prepared horseradish
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon celery salt
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Mix all ingredients together, adjusting spices according to taste. Refrigerate overnight so that flavors have a chance to blend.
Makes about 21⁄2 cups.
*Tastes great in place of mayo on sandwiches and in deviled eggs.
Chapter 35
Sadie glanced at Layla’s house. She could hear the faintest sound of applause coming through the open screen door. Then she looked back at Max, making the connection. “You like Layla?” Sadie asked, wondering how it was that a woman with a brain injury could still be so appealing to so many men. But as she looked at Max, she thought maybe she did understand. Layla was simple. Max was too, and probably lonely. Was it better to sit next to someone than to sit alone?
Max didn’t
answer the question, but she noticed him blush, and she suppressed a smile. In Garrison, Judy Bellows and Stan Highland, both of whom were mentally disabled, had gotten married about ten years ago. They lived in Judy’s mother’s basement and walked two miles together every day. Judy was almost sixty, and Stan was thirty-six. They always went to Bingo on Saturday nights, and it was impossible to see them together without feeling that while perhaps not traditional, their relationship worked.
“Did you burn the box I brought to Eric?” Sadie restated, wanting to make sure she understood what had happened.
He didn’t answer, but she noticed that he’d started tapping his foot.
“I’m not mad that you did it,” Sadie said, keeping her voice neutral. “Did Larry tell you to burn the box?”
After a few seconds, he nodded.
Interesting. “Why?”
“I dunno,” Max said. “He said he might get in trouble if I didn’t.”
“And he paid you to do it?”
Max shrugged, but Sadie could see the slight outline in his T-shirt pocket of what looked like it could be folded bills. Sadie wondered how much burning the box had been worth to Larry. But whatever he had wanted hidden was gone. She hated that he’d succeeded.
She looked at the Staples box by the door. “What’s in there?” she asked, nodding toward it.
“Deliveries,” Max said. He actually engaged enough in the conversation to look at the box. “For Tia.”
“Would you like me to take it into the office so you don’t have to get up?” It was a subtle way to push for how much he might offer, but Sadie didn’t know if he would catch it.
He shrugged, and Sadie stepped farther onto the porch so she could pick up the box.
The first door on the right in the hallway was definitely Tia’s room—it was floral and tidy. The bedroom on the left had to belong to Max—a queen bed topped with rumpled sheets. She pushed open the third door and scanned the home office, taking in the plastic table that served as a desk, a couple of filing cabinets, and a bookshelf. A certificate of appreciation from the Salvation Army hung on the wall with the name “Tia Gerald” written in as the recipient. And there were a few more photos of Tia posing with people holding medals. Special Olympics?
Key Lime Pie Page 22
