1 Hot Scheming Mess (21 page)

It took her a second to realize who he meant. She wanted to offer an explanation until he said, “Or should I say how
was
he?” Madison felt heat rise to her cheeks, her eyes taking on that icy green color she had when she was angry. “I’m guessing that he would have been great. But we were a little interrupted, thank you. Things didn’t go so well after that.”

He did a poor job of hiding a smile, and said, “Glad to be of service.”

She said, “And his name is ExBoy.” Jason actually stopped at that. His hands on the counter, he leaned forward saying, “What kind of a shit ass name is ExBoy?”

“Oh, come on. It’s just a nickname,” she said.

“So is Pizzaman.” Madison had enough and turned to walk out, but Jason said, “Why didn’t you tell me you had a boyfriend?” She turned around. He was looking at her, his eyes a little hard. He continued, “You could tell I was interested. You could’ve saved me feeling like an ass.”

“He isn’t my boyfriend.”

He looked surprised. “Fuck buddy?”

“What is it with you guys and fuck buddies? No! He’s not a fuck buddy. Okay?” Jason appeared to be waiting for more. She continued, “He literally showed up unannounced with a pizza. We’ve been dancing all around the edges of trying a relationship, but we never seem to…” She expelled her breath in exasperation. “Look,” she said. “If I want to get laid, that is my business.” She poked her finger into her chest. “My… business. I’ve made no commitment to anyone, and I don’t owe you any explanation!” Whirling around, she headed for the door, carefully stepping around an elderly lady seated at one of the small tables.

After another thought, Madison stopped and turned around. Jason still leaned forward on the counter, his eyes suddenly looking back up. He had been watching her backside, too. She said, “If you come over unannounced again, you might keep finding naked men in my apartment.” Customers were lifting heads and looking at her. She added, “So get over it!”

The elderly lady nearby leaned in and said, “You tell him, honey.”

Madison resumed walking to the door but stopped and whirled around one last time. Loud enough for Jason to hear across the cafe, she said, “And I am not now, nor ever have been, anyone’s fuck buddy! Get it?” Nearby customers nodded at her a bit wide-eyed.

She stormed out the door, the little bells jingling their rage. She crossed the parking lot to her car and proceeded to thump her head on the roof of her car, again and again.
I knew I would ruin it! I knew it, I knew it, I…
Hurried footsteps. She turned around, and Jason snatched her up, her feet dangling in the air, his full lips locked on hers, her waist pulled in tight, forcing an arch at the small of her back as he bent slightly forward. She was in shock for the few seconds, but her engine revved up fast, putting her arms around him. She knew this was presumptuous on his part, but she didn’t care.

He released the kiss suddenly, setting her down fast. His hands held firm on her upper arms. Her breathing was still coming quick as he said, “If you never got laid last night, you can’t blame me. I would have got the job done.” With that he stalked off, going back to work.

Madison ran at him, and as he turned around to the sound of her pounding footsteps, she jumped up into his chest. The momentum threw him back, as she wrapped her legs around his waist, her fists in his curly brown hair. He stumbled, his hands under her rump, trying to catch his balance, and wound up with his back against a large bush by the cafe window. His feet slid in a small patch of wet grass at the base of the bush, and they went down in their kiss, landing on his butt. Madison’s leg muscles pulled him in hard as her fists in his hair pulled him away from her face. She said, “You have no idea what I put him through last night. I may be horny out of my mind, but I’m not easy. Nothing is, anymore.” She stood up and turned to go back to her car but was stopped at a thumping on the window, with a muffled voice coming from behind the glass.

“Dude, Potatoes!” The barista guy from yesterday morning had a manic smile on his face. “Behave yourself, girl!” He stood with some of the customers at the window, watching Madison and Jason. He gave Jason the thumbs up as Madison hurried back to her car.

Chapter Twenty-One

Spenser was not pleased. At all.

“She’d better not come near me. I’ll kill her!” Spenser said viciously. “Why didn’t Daniel tell me about this? I’ll kill him, too.”

“Spenser, please. It’s not like she was kissing him or anything. She was quietly and efficiently, kicking everyone’s ass. He’s probably embarrassed.”

Spenser stood up, walked over to an end table and grabbed her cell phone. She punched a few speed dial buttons as she muttered angry sounds and put the phone on her ear. The other hand went on her hip.

Madison was glad it wasn’t her on Spenser’s bad side this morning. Daniel must’ve known that Madison would talk about last night’s street fight with Spenser. He should have told her himself, not that it would make any difference in the outcome, but at least Spenser wouldn’t now be feeling like he was hiding anything serious from her. She told her that Daniel had a sizable goose egg on the back of his head when she’d left last night.

Madison now found herself in a place of questioning everything, suspecting everyone, to the point that she didn’t know if she was being foolish to think that the woman in black last night was part of this mess or foolish not to. Seattle was, after all, known to have several self-proclaimed defenders of justice, complete with homemade costumes. What a town.

“I think you left something out last night,” said Spenser into the phone. Walking into the other room, probably for privacy, Spenser’s voice faded into the background as she spoke with Daniel on the phone, and the sounds of the washer and dryer came forward in Madison’s hearing.

At the very least, spilling some of last night’s experiences to Spenser put a little sanity back into Madison. The act of sharing some of her heart with a friend who understood, who got it, was a luxury that Madison now realized she had been taking for granted. Because now, unlike normal days, she was not at liberty to tell Spenser everything. The FBI search, the revelation of Grandpa flying to DC, Mitch and Ray, and the escape of Unibrow, formerly known as Mr. Duct Tape, were getting harder and harder to skip over. And now there was Jason! Not being able to share those details made her want to squeeze every moment out of the details that she did feel free to share, such as the street fight from last night, the latest episode of her ridiculous love life, and her painful argument with her mother.

She was trying to figure out how she would describe Toonie to Spenser when she realized that she hadn’t eaten Toonie’s cookies from yesterday. She poured herself a warm-up of the coffee and pulled out the little baggie from her big tote bag.

Once Spenser returned, Madison offered one of the cookies to her. They each took a bite and chewed as the heavenly flavor came forth.
Oh, my God.
They looked at each other with wide eyes, their jaws working. Their euphoric sounds mingled.

Spenser asked, “Where did you get these?”

Madison swallowed. “My neighbor Toonie made them. She says it’s a secret recipe that she doesn’t give out.”

“That’s just wrong,” Spenser said. “These could bring about world peace.”

Madison added, “Or start a war.” They each had one more with their coffee and sighed at the thought that there were no more cookies. “Wow,” said Madison. “Those were day-old cookies. She gave them to me yesterday.”

She heard the ding from the dryer, indicating that the laundry load was finished. Madison took another quick sip of her coffee and hurried to the dryer, sorting her clothes and folding them up. ExBoy’s t-shirt was now nicely clean and folded. She kept it separate from the rest of her laundry to return it to him later, and threw the second load from the washing machine into the dryer. She still had some clothes left to wash, but it wasn’t enough to make a full load.

“Spenser?” she called out. “Do you have anything you want washed? We can add it to my stuff to make a full load.”

Spenser called back, “Let me go check.”

Madison came back to the table, reached down into her tote, and pulled out the fabric that had been in the metal box. It was some old tablecloth that Grandpa had used to pad out the metal box and maybe provide a little protection for the paperwork and clippings. She figured she might as well add it to the laundry load. She opened the first fold of the fabric, and saw that there was a huge stain on it, like brown water. It looked gross, so she put it on the floor and kneeled down next to it, slowly opening up each fold. It seemed to be an old linen tablecloth with a towel folded up inside. Madison’s heart started to race, as Spenser walked back in saying, “I don’t really have any clothes to add…” she stopped at the fearful expression on Madison’s face. The towel’s stain was heavier and even deeper in color. Old blood made the towel stiff and resistant to being unfolded. The initials WP were monogrammed on the towel.

Madison worked hard to control her voice but it still came out a little shaky as she said, “What am I supposed to make of that? I mean besides the fact that it really resembles a blood stain, and besides the fact that I’m a little lightheaded right now, I’m thinking maybe I had better not wash it.”

Alarmed, Spenser asked, “Where did that come from?”

“This was in that old metal box. I thought it was in there for padding,” said Madison.

“Part of the clues?” asked Spenser.

Madison looked down at the stained fabrics in front of her. She didn’t want to say yes. That might make it more real. So she settled for nodding her head.

A thought occurred to her, and she grabbed the tote bag, pulling out the cardboard, saying, “This was in the metal box, too.” She flattened out the pieces of cardboard, and by following the various fold lines, it was easy to return it to its previous state of a small cardboard box. It too had some stains in it but they were much lighter. The odd shape of the stain at the bottom of the box, matched the shape of the stain on the tablecloth. Madison put the tablecloth into the box, lining up the shapes. Whatever had stained the tablecloth had soaked through to the box, leaving the same wet shape.

She looked at the old blood stain on the towel. It was in the center of the towel, was darker in color, and had spread further out to the sides than it had on the tablecloth. She put the towel on top of the tablecloth and lined up the shapes again. Something watery, combined with some blood, had happened on that towel, then soaked through the tablecloth to the box. She looked at it, perplexed, sick with worry.

She thought of the old newspaper clippings and the odd birth certificate. The point of it was still escaping her. Her grandfather had said “especially don’t tell Ann, promise me. Don’t tell Ann.”

She crawled across the floor to where she had left her purse, digging furiously through it as she kneeled, and pulled out the old black and white photo of a young Vincent Cruz, the shot taken through the leaves of a bush. She didn’t care any longer if Spenser saw it or not. She needed her friend near her right now.

The small box in the photo was a match. Her grandfather stood over this same box, holding this tablecloth and towel, with something else inside.

The answer presented itself to her. In a soft and mournful tone, she said, “Oh.” She put her hand at her mouth and said through her fingers, “Poor thing.”

“What?” asked Spenser, shaking her hands up and down as if they were burned. “Madison, you’re scaring me. What is it?”

“Remember the birth certificate we saw?”

“Yes,” said Spenser. “You said your mom’s birth date was off by almost two months.” Madison looked at the sad messy fabrics in the box, and said, “I’m starting to think that was her real birth date. She was born during the International Student Exposition.” Her earlier sense of injustice shifted over and made room for someone else.

She held up the photo for Spenser to see, and Spenser took it, studying it closely. “I think my grandfather found this box when he was a young gardener at the UW. I think an abandoned baby was in it.” She pushed her fingers through her hair as she stared at the box, the far-reaching implications hitting home.

“He took it home to my grandmother.” Her mother was adopted. And because there were conflicting birth certificates, it was probably done illegally.

“So who took this picture?” asked Spenser.

“Whoever blackmailed him,” she said.

Why would Grandpa have all this stuff hidden for so long? Why hadn’t he thrown it all away when her mother was still a baby? What was he saving it for and what had he told the FBI in DC? Was he confessing to being a baby stealer?

Spenser was on the floor with her. From her side, she had her arms wrapped around Madison, and said, “You know it doesn’t matter, right? You know that. I want to hear you say it before you leave here.”

Madison put her hands up on Spenser’s forearm and said, “Don’t worry. Of course I know. Spensy, you’re such a good friend; I don’t deserve you. But for the first time I wonder if my mom has anyone like you in her life. I mean, who will she have to talk to about this when she finds out?” Anger on behalf of her mother began to ignite in Madison.

“Look at how they left her. A baby wrapped in a towel, soaked in her own birthing fluids and blood.” Tears burned her eyes. “They didn’t even have the decency to clean her up and wrap her in something clean and dry.”

Spenser reached out and ran her fingers over the monogrammed initials. “It’s that WP logo again, from the hotel we read about in the clippings.”

“I saw that.”

“She must have been born in there. So odd. An expensive hotel. Then she winds up in a box.”

“That’s why Grandpa kept all those clippings about the International Student Exposition. All the students, and their guardians, and the judges, were put up in that high rise hotel. I hid all that paperwork at Robot Moon Productions. I was going to go get it out today, anyway.”

She took a deep breath and exhaled. She said, “I have to get ready for back-to-back singing telegrams today. Then I’ll get over there and retrieve the paperwork.”