“Ate it in front of her like I told her I would. I had to stuff it in so fast I couldn’t even enjoy it.”
That would account for the smear of chocolate at the corner of his mouth.
“You do know this diet she’s on is insane,” she said.
“I’m hoping she’ll figure that out, but until then I have a job to do.” He tore off a second chunk. “I’ll have to search you from now on.”
“Search me?”
“Nothing personal.”
Nothing personal, indeed!
Chapter Fourteen
I DON’T SEE WHY WE HAVE to go to church,” Toby said.
“Take it up with your best friend Big Mike.” Bree knew she sounded petty, but she couldn’t help herself. She slipped into her only remaining pair of heels, strappy bronze stilettos that would make her as tall as Mike. As a bonus, she could always use the heels to stab any serpents that might escape during the worship service.
For the past five days, she’d tried to come up with a way to get out of this, but Mike had backed her into a corner. As long as she was responsible for Toby, she couldn’t afford to have Mike blackball her in the community, something he was perfectly capable of doing. He was a big man outside, but inside, he was small and petty, and he had years of practice manipulating people to do what he wanted.
“We have to go to church because of the way you act so mean to Big Mike,” Toby said. “I’ll bet he thinks you’re going to hell.”
Just then Mike’s red Cadillac pulled into the drive. She still couldn’t figure out the best way to warn Toby to keep his guard up. “Mike’s been nice to you,” she said tentatively, “but… sometimes people aren’t always exactly the way they seem.”
He shot her a look that branded her the dumbest person on earth and dashed out the door, the tail of his plaid shirt flapping. So much for good intentions.
She’d tucked her hair into a fashionably untidy bun to accompany one of the few dresses she hadn’t put up for consignment, a sleeveless caramel sheath she’d accessorized with costume hoop earrings. Her arms still felt bare without her bangles. She’d sold all her good jewelry months ago, along with her two-carat engagement ring. As for her wedding ring… The night Scott had left her, she’d driven to the club and thrown it in the pond by the eighteenth green.
Mike hopped out of the car to open the door for her. She handed him the computer laptop he’d given her. “Thank you,” she said stiffly, “but I’m sure you can find a better use for this.”
Toby clambered into the backseat. The interior smelled of good leather with only the faintest trace of Mike’s cologne. She cracked open a window anyway to get some air.
Mike set the computer in the backseat without commenting. Even before they pulled out onto the highway, Toby started chattering about his bike. When he finally paused for breath, Mike said, “Why don’t you ride it in the Fourth of July parade tomorrow?”
“Could I?” Toby asked Mike, not her.
“Sure.” Mike glanced over at Bree. “We finished work on my float yesterday. This year’s theme is ‘Island in the Sun.’”
“Catchy.” How she’d once loved the way this parade marked the beginning of another magical island summer.
“I always have the biggest float,” he bragged. “Hey, why don’t you ride on it?”
“I’ll pass.”
Mike shook his head and grinned, no better at picking up on social cues than he’d ever been. “Remember the year you and Star talked your way onto the Rotary float? Star fell off the back, and Nate Lorris nearly ran her over with his tractor?”
She and Star had laughed until they’d both wet their pants. “No. I don’t remember.”
“Sure you do. Star was always angling for a way to get the two of you on a float.”
She’d always managed it, too. They’d ridden on floats for Dogs ’N’ Malts, Maggie’s Fudge Shop, the Knights of Columbus, and the old barbecue joint that had burned down. Once Star had even gotten them onto the Boy Scouts’ float.
Toby piped up from the rear. “Gram said my mom was worthless.” He delivered this statement so matter-of- factly that Bree was taken aback, but Mr. Salesman had an answer for everything.
“Your gram said that out of sadness. Your mom was restless, and sometimes she could be a little immature, but she wasn’t worthless.”
Toby kicked the back of the seat with no particular venom. “I hate her.”
Toby’s antipathy for his mother was disturbing, even though Bree felt the same. Although lately her resentment toward Star had begun to seem more like the dregs of an old head cold than a full-blown attack of the flu.
Once again, Mike stepped into the breach. “You didn’t know your mother, Toby. Sure she had her faults-we all do-but there were a lot more good things about her.”
“Like running out on me and Gram and my dad?”
“She had this thing called postpartum depression. Sometime women get it after they have babies. I’m sure she didn’t mean to stay away for long.”
Myra had never said anything to Bree about postpartum depression. She’d said Star couldn’t stand being stuck with a baby and had run away so she could “cat around.”
As they reached town, Bree hoped the subject of Star was closed, but bigmouthed Mike couldn’t leave it alone. “Your mom and Bree were best friends. I bet Bree can tell you lots of good things about your mom.”
Bree stiffened.
“I bet she can’t,” Toby said.
She had to say something. Anything. She forced her jaw to move. “Your mother was… very beautiful. We… all wanted to look like her.”
“That’s true.” The glance Mike darted at her held unmistakable reproof. Mike Moody, the master of misdeeds, was judging her for not coming up with something more meaningful, but Toby didn’t seem to notice.
They’d reached the church. The
Bree looked at Mike. “Serpents and speaking in tongues?”
He grinned. “It could happen.”
A joke at her expense. Still, some of her tension began to fade.
BREE HAD ATTENDED THE METHODIST church as a child, but organized religion with all its unanswered questions had eventually felt too burdensome, and she’d stopped not long after she got married. Mike found seats for them off to the side beneath a stained-glass window of Jesus blessing the multitudes.
As she relaxed into the rhythm of the service, her mood began to lift. For now anyway there were no beehives, no tomato plants to water or weeds to pull. No customers to entice or young boy to disappoint. The possibility that she might not be alone on this planet, that something larger might be watching out for her, gave her a fragile comfort.
Occasionally Mike’s arm, big and solid in a navy suit coat, brushed against hers. As long as she didn’t look at his gold-link bracelet or big college ring, she could pretend he was someone else-one of those steadfast, dependable men with solid values and a faithful heart. He closed his eyes for the prayers, listened attentively to the sermon, and sang the first verses of every hymn without consulting the hymnal.
After the service, he worked the crowd, slapping the men on the back, flattering the women, telling one of the deacons about a house going on the market, turning church into another sales opportunity. Everybody sucked up to him, except it didn’t exactly seem that way. They acted as if they genuinely liked him. The adult Mike Moody was beginning to confuse her, although he still didn’t seem to have any clue about how patronizing he could be, since he
