You Dropped a Blonde on Me (49 page)
Lacey gulped, her slender neck muscles moving in time with her sobs. “Yes. I didn’t know Fin was hiding it from you!” she cried. “I never even looked at the postmark or the return address. I just forwarded it to you at your mother’s. But—but—”
“But?” Max demanded.
Tears streamed down her face, creating red paths of salty moisture. “Finley got so mad when he found out I’d taken it from his desk. I was just—just—trying to take care of everything so he wouldn’t be so stressed and uptight. With the divorce and him always yelling at me to get it together, I thought I was helping! But he said,” she paused, gasping out choppy breaths, “he said if I was more like you, I wouldn’t have made such a big mistake. He said I should never have gone through his things, but I swear, it was right on his desk, Maxine. And now—now—”
“He called off the engagement,” Len said with disgust, her face filled with unmasked fury. “I did tell you he was a bastard, didn’t I, Lacey? I told you you’d end up just like—”
“Don’t, Len,” Max cut her off. Clear as day, she understood Lacey. Like a glove, she could just as easily slip back on the pain Lacey was suffering. Her identifying with this child, twenty years her junior, knowing she’d been saved from a pain far greater, kept at bay any smug wish to break her like she herself had been broken. “Don’t beat her up anymore. I don’t think Fin was ever going to marry her anyway. I think using me and my refusal to sign off on the divorce was a perfect excuse to stall her. Fin knew I couldn’t fight him on the prenup, but Connor is entitled to an education. He knew I wouldn’t sign that away so easily, and it bought him time. Just be glad she got out now and not twenty years down the road.”
Lacey’s wet gulps were so familiar, so riddled with agony, Maxine almost wanted to wrap her arms around her young nemesis and comfort her. But she didn’t know if she could ever be that gracious to a woman, child or not, who’d slept with a married man. “So the letter. It was in Fin’s possession? You’re sure, Lacey?”
Her face crumpled, her red eyes scrunching closed. “Right on his desk.”
Len looked at Maxine with unveiled concern. “And what do you suppose that means?”
“I don’t know. But it can’t be good.” What reason could Fin have for keeping his mother’s letter from her? Not for a second did she doubt it was another one of his sneaky ploys.
Lacey sobbed to the point of choking, and that was where Maxine’s patience went south. “Take her home.
Please
,” she begged Len.
Please
,” she begged Len.
Gathering up Lacey on one arm, Len planted a kiss on her cheek. “Have you talked to Campbell yet?”
“Have you talked to Adam?” Max countered.
“No. But my situation’s different. Don’t let this go too long. Be strong, grasshopper,” she joked with a grin.
Max’s response was reasonable and calm and more together than she could ever remember feeling. “I could say the same to you, partner. And it’s only been four days since Campbell dumped me. I totally deserved it. I figured I’d better let him cool down before I whammy him. I have to do this right, Len. I want him to know I mean it. Really, really mean it.”
“I can’t believe you’re not a total immobilized wreck, Maxine Cambridge. I’ve never seen you so collected. I’d shed a proud tear, but there’s enough of that going around.” She pointed to Lacey.
Max rubbed Len’s shoulders. “True, I’m not falling apart, but it’s a miracle my mother has any stainless left on her steel sink,” she said wryly, pointing to the sponge. “I’m really okay. I’d rather be great, but I’ll settle for okay for now. I think this time, I really get that love doesn’t have to consume you to the point of suicide. My life’s fuller that it ever was. I replaced all those mani-pedis and spa treatments with some self-worth. Now I just have to convince Campbell I get it. Anyway, you batten down the hatches and go take care of your sister.”
“Call me later so we can toss some theories around about that letter, okay?”
Maxine nodded with a faint smile, not taking even an ounce of pleasure when she heard Lacey cry out again on her way out the door, “I love him, Lenore! I can’t live without him!”
“Yeah,” Len snorted in return. “Ain’t love grand?”
Their departure left Max with just her thoughts and the feeling a big chunk of this puzzle Dorothy had created was bringing Finley some serious grief.
She did smile at that. Petty it was, but her smile was shadowed with the sad fact that she might never understand what Dorothy meant.
Not unless she killed Finley for the 411.
Which made her smile again.
Max sucked in a shuddering breath of air. Sick with nerves, her intestines growled in protest.
Her reflection in the mirror made her chant, “You will be strong, Max. You will go after what you want, and if the answer is no, you’ll go right on doing what you do. Just like you have after you did the stupidest thing since signing a prenup. You’re strong, empowered—wildly in love. Now go get your man!” She growled into the mirror then blew herself a kiss. She was going to go get Campbell Barker and never let him go.
Ever.
The sound of clapping from the bathroom doorway startled her. “It’s about time.”
“Ya think?” Max hugged her mother hard.
“I think. But before you go off to war, Joe Hodge is here. Says Jake’s lost.”
“Oh, no!” She flew past her mother to run to the front door. “Mr. Hodge?”
His usually cheerful, moon-shaped face held worry. “I hate to bother ya, Maxine, but Jake got out on me. I can’t find the damn dog anywhere. I’ve been callin’ him for over an hour. But I see you’re all dressed up. I’m sorry to bring my troubles to your doorstep.” He turned to leave, but Max stuck a finger in his suspenders to stop him.
“It’s no trouble, Mr. Hodge. But I worry because Jake’s so cranky. If he corners someone like Mr. Lowell, for sure we’ll have complaints from the association. Let me grab my purse and we’ll go hunt him down.” She and Jake had become frenemies of sorts. He tolerated her as long as she brought him treats and scratched his belly. Over the past few months, he’d finally come to enjoy his walks with Max.
Purse tucked under her arm, she stepped out of her mother’s, shivering at the purpled, frosty evening. The weather had become unseasonably cold so early in the fall. “Let’s go.”
He reached into his pocket. “Hold on. My phone’s vibratin’. Hello? That little shit,” he cackled into the phone. “Okay. Thanks much, Maude.” Winking at Max, he held up the phone. “Maude says she saw him over at the rec center but just a minute ago. Hurry up and get in the truck so we can catch him.”
On the ride to the rec center, Max rolled down the window, calling out Jake’s name on the off chance he might have wandered.
As they pulled up, Max wondered aloud at all the cars parked in the lot. “Do you crazies have some kind of illegal gambling going on you forgot to share with your village event coordinator?” She shot Joe a secretive smile, shaking a finger of admonishment. “Because if you didn’t let me in on the chance to make some extra cash, I’d be very,
very
hurt.”
very
hurt.”
Joe slid out of his truck, grunting when his knees bent. He made his way around the front end and opened the door for Max, holding out his hand. “Nothing illegal going on here. You just go on inside,” he encouraged with a sly smile.
Her head tilted to the right. “Joe? What’s going on?”
Ushering her with a hand to her lower back, Joe gave her a final push. “Go on in and see.”
The doors burst open to the yelps of “Surprise!”
A sea of seniors’ faces greeted her. Confetti in colored pieces flew in the air, landing in Max’s hair and her open mouth of surprise. Noisemakers sounded off in screeching blares. Bunches of multicolored balloons that read “Happy Birthday” were tied to chairs. Big band music screamed from the rec center’s speakers, and a table full of goodies lined the back wall. “What . . .” It wasn’t her birthday.
Mary, Gail, Connor, and Mona held a sheet cake between them, candles lit and glowing. Their smiles were wide and smug. “Blow ’em out, Maxie, before we drop the whole damned thing on the floor,” her mother shouted over the merriment.
“
How
did you keep this from me?”
How
did you keep this from me?”
“Oh, it wasn’t easy—specially with that busybody Esther. But I still have a trick or two up my sleeve,” Mona said, pleased with herself.
“But, Mom. It’s not my birthday. You know that,” she chided with affection.
“It’s your re-birthday, honey,” Mary supplied with a wink. “You’ve been here in the village a whole year, and look at all the things you’ve accomplished. Some of us in the village thought that was worth celebrating. Now blow the candles out!”
A year.
A year since she’d turned up at her mother’s, broken and battered. A year since she’d packed one lowly bag, thrown Connor in the car, and left everything she thought she loved behind. A year filled with more tears than she thought a body could hold in water weight.
Now, a year later, she’d found purpose, and meaning in discovering she didn’t need anyone else to help her do that but herself.
“C’mon, Mom. Blow them out,” Connor shouted, and everyone else followed suit. “Blow them out! Blow them out!” he chanted.
Max leaned forward with a grin, holding her hair out of the way to let go of a huge breath. Cheers and clapping rang in her ears as she made her way through the room, hugging the people who’d come to mean so much to her.
She grabbed Joe on her way to the table where, she’d been informed, everyone had chipped in to make a potluck dinner in her honor. Max caught Joe on the cheek with a kiss. Two bright red spots appeared on his forehead. “You’re a sly one, Mr. Hodge. Thank you. This is wonderful.”
“Be better if your young man was here, don’t you think? I extended the invite to him, but I don’t see him.”
He was the last piece to the puzzle of an otherwise terrific night. “He’s pretty mad at me, Mr. Hodge, and he should be. I’ve not been an easy girl to love.”
Mr. Hodge pinched her cheek. “But you sure are a purty one. Any smart guy can forgive a pretty girl. Garner’s over there, flirtin’ with Leona. Why don’t you go ask him where that boy of his is?” He shooed her away with a craggy hand.
Max attempted to wend her way through the room amidst more hugs and cheerful well wishes, making a beeline for Garner, but Len jumped in front of her to give her a hug, paper plate of cake in her hand. “Happy re-birthday!” She chuckled. “They did some job, huh?”
“You knew, too?”
“Who do you think hooked them up with the cake?”
Max’s smile beamed at her friend. “Thank you. You all did a wonderful job. But I’m on a mission. I need to find Campbell. Have you seen him?”
Len stuffed a bite of chocolate cake in her mouth. “Nope, but his dad’s over there. C’mon. We’ll go ask him where he is.” Taking her hand, Len set down her cake and pulled Max toward Garner.
“Maxine?”
She whirled to the tune of a semi-familiar voice and smiled when she saw whom the voice was attached to. “Adam, right? Adam Baylor. Len and I were just talking about you.” Daring Len to say otherwise, she took his hand to shake.
His eyebrow rose as he perused Len’s face. “Actually, it’s Adam Baylor
Crestwall,
and if I may, I’d like to talk to you.
Privately
.” He handed her a business card, pointedly giving Len an expression of unfiltered anger.
Crestwall,
and if I may, I’d like to talk to you.
Privately
.” He handed her a business card, pointedly giving Len an expression of unfiltered anger.
Len’s face shattered, and Max noted she didn’t even bother to hide it. “You can say whatever you have to say in front of Len, Adam. We have no secrets.”
In what Max would’ve considered a petty move if Len hadn’t behaved like such an ass toward Adam, he turned his back to her friend and gazed down at Max. “Your mother-in-law was Dorothy Cambridge, correct?”
He’d caught her off guard. “She was . . .”
“My father, Wyatt Crestwall, was her attorney. He handled her last will and testament.”
Max shot him a confused look. “Okay.”
His expression was of shame, but direct and intense as though he was internally battling with something. “Look, there’s no other way to say this, and my apologies in advance. My father aided your husband, Finley Cambridge, in stealing a rather large sum of money from you and your son, Connor. Dorothy Cambridge left you a handsome trust fund to be managed by you at your discretion in the event you would need financial security apart from your husband.”
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