Big Daddy Sinatra: Carly's Cry (22 page)

After her embrace of her parents
ended, and it was clear that they had accepted her apology, she moved away from
them and began heading upstairs.

Jenay turned toward her.
 
“Where are you going?” she asked.

“To change,” Carly responded.
 
“They’re having a car wash at Saint
Cat’s.”
 
Then she swallowed hard.
 
It was a bitter pill to swallow.
 
“They expect me to be there,” she added, and
hurried upstairs.

Charles looked at her as she left the
room.
 
Donald and Ashley looked at him,
surprised that he didn’t run Carly down and knock her through a wall.
 
But they didn’t see anger in their father’s
eyes.
 
They saw pain.
 
Tremendous pain.
 
Jenay looked at him.
 
She saw it too.

“I’ve got to get ready for work,”
Charles said, and left.
 
He headed
upstairs too.

Jenay exhaled.
 
She could just feel his agony.

Donald and Ashley, however, could
only feel their own.
 
“I told you,”
Donald said.
 
“Carly gets away with
everything.
 
If that had been me or Ash
who slapped Dad like that, we’d be on the floor.”

“They wouldn’t even have to call
Rescue,” Ashley agreed.

“That’s right,” Donald said, nodding
his head.
 
“Because we would have already
been dead!
 
Dad would have killed us on
the spot.
 
I told you, Ma.
 
You think we be lying.
 
But I told you.
 
Carly gets away with murder!”

Jenay looked at Donald and Ashley as
if they knew about that night in Boston.
 
She looked at them as if they had just revealed the great secret of the
universe.
 
And then she realized who she
was talking about.
 
Donald and
Ashley.
 
Both of them together wouldn’t
have brains enough to reveal their own secrets, let alone somebody else’s.
 
“Boy, if you don’t leave me alone,” she said
to Donald, and headed upstairs too.

Jenay stopped her Mercedes in front
of Charles storefront office building, grabbed her paperwork, and got out.
 
She hurried across the sidewalk, speaking to
a passerby, as she entered the building.

Her stepson Robert was there, sitting
on the edge of the desk of one of the clerks, running his hand through his
thick, blond hair and making her laugh at his dirty jokes.
 
He smiled when he saw Jenay.
 
“Hey, Ma,” he said.
 
“I heard there were fireworks at the house
this morning.”

“Is he in?” Jenay asked.

“He’s in.
 
But he’s in a nasty mood.
 
He told us that he doesn’t want to be
bothered.
 
With no exceptions, he said.”

Jenay headed straight for his office.

“Of course he didn’t mean you,”
Robert said out of earshot of Jenay, and the ladies in the office laughed.

Jenay heard the laughter but didn’t
care what it was about.
 
Charles was on
her mind.
 
And their daughter.
 
She knocked once on his closed office door,
and entered.

Charles was seated behind his desk,
but his back was to the door.
 
He was
looking out of his window.

Jenay walked slowly into the office,
and then walked around to the window.
 
He
didn’t react, as if he knew it was her all along.
 
He just continued to stare.

“Carly’s at Saint Catherine’s,” he
said.

Jenay didn’t expect him to say
that.
 
“You went there?”

 
“I saw her.
 
She’s where she said she was going to be.
 
And when I drove up, to get my car washed,
guess what she did?”

Jenay braced herself.
 
“What?
 
She continued to argue with you?
 
She cussed you out? What?”

“She smiled as if nothing had
happened.
 
She’s still wearing that
got
damn mask, Jenay.”
 
He looked at his wife.
 
“And I can’t do a damn thing about it!”

Jenay let out a harsh exhale.
 
“I found something, Charles,” she said.

Charles, leaned back in his chair,
looked at her.
 
“What?”

Jenay handed him the folder that was
in her hand.
 
“That’s Trevor Reese’s
client list for his marketing firm.
 
The
list Mick’s man gave to you.”

“Yeah, so?” He began thumbing through
the paperwork in the folder.

“Look on page seven.”

Charles looked.
 
“Okay,” he said.
 
“What am I looking for?”

“Go to the F’s,” Jenay said.

He did.
 
At first he didn’t see it.
 
Then he did.
 
He leaned forward.
 
“Sharon
Flannigan,” he said, and then looked at Jenay.
 
“Where do I know that name?”

“Oh, Charles, don’t you
remember?
 
She’s the new Headmistress at
Saint Catherine’s.”

Charles stood to his feet.
 
“And she’s on Reese’s client list?”

“And she was in the lobby when that
agitator fired those shots,” Jenay said.

For the first time in weeks, Charles
felt as if they were getting somewhere.
 
“Where is she?
 
At that car wash?”

“No, she just got back to the
Inn.
 
I saw her go to her room just
before I discovered this.
 
I didn’t know
how to approach her.
 
I came to you.”

“You did right, baby,” Charles said,
squeezing her arm.
 
“Let’s go,” he added,
as he grabbed his suitcoat off of the back of his chair, and hurried out.

“She left, you know.”

Carly was standing there in a pair of
shorts and a tucked-in shell top.
 
She
wasn’t washing cars, because they had more than enough students present to
handle that.
 
She, instead, spent most of
her time standing around and thinking.

“You heard me, Carly?”
 
It was Marge, one of her fellow
teachers.
 
They were standing in the
parking lot of the Saint Catherine’s Prep Academy as a dozen students washed a
steady flow of cars.

“You heard me, Carly?”

“What is it?” Carly asked.

“Our Headmistress.
 
She left already.
 
I know she didn’t have to be here at all,
just as we don’t have to be.
 
But it’s
about supporting the students.
 
She could
have at least stayed until the end of the day.”
 
She looked at Carly.
 
“Don’t you
agree?”

Carly thought about it.
 
“No,” she said, and looked at Marge.

Marge was surprised.
 
“No?
 
Why would you say no?”

“She’s not needed here.
 
The kids are washing the cars.
 
The vestry’s hand-picked chaperones are
handling the traffic and the money.
 
Why
should she have to stand out here all day?
 
Why should we?”

Marge was confused.
 
“To prove that we’re supportive,” she said.

“But to prove it to whom?
 
The students?
 
They don’t care.
 
The
Headmistress?
 
She doesn’t care.”

“To prove it to ourselves then.”

“To prove what to ourselves, Marge?”
Carly asked.

Marge was flustered.
 
It wasn’t something she had ever thought
about.
 
“I don’t know.
 
It’s expected of us to be here, if we’re good
teachers.
 
Why are you asking me such questions?
 
I do what I’m told.”

And that was when it hit Carly.
 
Once again, she was doing what was expected
of her.
 
Not what she wanted to do.
 
Not even what other people wanted her to
do.
 
But what she
assumed
they wanted her to do.
 
She wasn’t even doing what she was told, as Marge put it, but what she
assumed
they wanted to tell her to
do.
 
She was being good Carly all over
again.
 
Going above and beyond.
 
Being Miss Perfect, as Donald and Ashley sneeringly
called her.
 
And she was unhappy.
 
And nobody cared.

She looked at her fellow
teacher.
 
“Goodbye, Marge,” she said, and
began walking away.

“You’re leaving already too?
 
I thought we were going to stay until the end
of the day.
 
Carly?
 
Carly
?”

But Carly had already tuned her, and
everybody else, out.
 
She walked to her
VW Beetle, out of the shop and good to go, got in, and took off.
 
It was Saturday.
 
She had no husband, no children to get home
to.
 
She was going to do what she wanted
to do for a change.

Tony Sinatra saw her as soon as he
walked into the Inn.
 
He came by to say
hey to his stepmother, which he often did, but when he saw Sharon eating her
dinner in the restaurant inside the Inn, he headed in that direction.

Sharon let out a harsh exhale as he
approached, which didn’t help his confidence, but Tony had a way of shielding
himself.
 
He smiled broadly.
 
“Hello, stranger.”

Sharon understood the reference.
 
They hadn’t seen each other since he came by
her hotel room after the shooting.
 
Her
choice.
 
“Hello.”

“Having dinner, I see.”

“Yes.”

“May I join you?”

He could tell she didn’t want that,
but she was in a shell too.
 
He
pressed.
 
“I won’t bite, I promise,” he
said.

She smiled.
 
“You may.”

Tony sat down across from her.

“Have some?” she asked.

“Between you and me,” he said, “I
wouldn’t eat the food here if my life depended on it.”

She looked at him with horror in her
eyes.

“No, I’m kidding,” he said, and she
relaxed.
 
“But I’m good.
 
Not hungry.”

Sharon continued to eat.

“I thought you’d be over at the
church,” Tony said.
 
“At the car wash.”

“I was there earlier, but I saw where
they had it well in hand.”

“So tell me, Miss Flannigan, how have
you been enjoying your stay in Jericho so far?”

“I’m still getting my sea legs, but I
think I’ll be fine.
 
The school needs a
lot of changes, but I’m game.”

“That’s the spirit,” Tony said for a
smile.
 
“I always figured old Joe
Huddleson to be the wrong jockey for a horse like that school, but what do I
know?”

“You know more than you give yourself
credit for,” Sharon said.
 
Then she
added: “I listen to your radio program.”

Tony smiled.
 
“Oh, yeah?
 
How often?”

She thought about it.
 
“Since I’ve been in town?
 
Every day,” she said.

Tony smiled greatly this time.
 
“Smart girl,” he said.

They continued to talk, mainly about
his broadcast, as Jenay and Charles entered the Inn.
 
Jenay saw them before her husband did.
 
“Over there,” she said.
 
“Come on.”

When Charles saw them, he took the
lead walking over to them.
 
Jenay felt it
was typical Charles.
 
Always protective
even thought she had no reason to fear Sharon.
 
There was reason to believe Sharon was involved with Trevor Reese, and
Trevor was involved with how Ethan Campbell’s body ended up in Carly’s former
house, but she didn’t fear the woman.
 
At
least not yet.
 
But Charles wasn’t taking
any chances.

Tony smiled when he saw his parents
approach.
 
“Dad, Mom.
 
Hey.”

Charles and Jenay sat at the
table.
 
Tony looked at Sharon.
 
He wondered how she felt about this
intrusion.

“You know Trevor Reese,” Charles said
to Sharon.

Tony didn’t understand.
 
He knew who Trevor Reese was.
 
He looked at Sharon.
 
Her expression remained unchanged.
 
“Excuse me?” she asked.

“Trevor Reese,” Charles said.
 
“What is your relationship with him?”

“Relationship?” Tony asked.
 
“She doesn’t have a relationship with Trevor Reese.”

“Sharon?” Jenay asked.

“I know him professionally.”

“You’re one of his clients?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I had an issue in Baltimore.
 
I needed my reputation rehabilitation.”

Tony looked at her.

Sharon paused.
 
“I had a relationship with a man I later
found out was married.
 
When his wife
found out, it devastated her, as you can imagine.
 
It devastated me.
 
But she killed him.”

Jenay’s heart dropped.
 
“Good Lord,” she said.

“And she went to jail,” Sharon
said.
 
“I was blamed.”

Tony stared at her.

“So my Bishop,” Sharon continued,
“recommended that I go and speak with Mr. Reese.
 
Mr. Reese discussed the matter with my
Bishop, after talking with me, and they came back with a proposition.
 
I can either get fired outright, or get
demoted and accept an assignment in Maine.
 
Jericho, Maine.”

“So Trevor Reese arranged for you to
come here?” Charles asked.

She nodded.
 
“Yes, sir.”

“Did he say why he suggested that
your Bishop send you here?” Charles asked.

“He didn’t say why, no.”

“What were you supposed to do when you
got here?” Jenay asked.