Marrying Maddy (9 page)

“You never liked her, did you?”

There was another silence. “I liked her, Joe,” Larry said at last. “I liked her a lot. What's not to like? She's cute, she's sweet, and until she ditched you, I thought she might just have been the best thing that ever happened to you. Remember, Joe, I'd been trying to get you to go into business for two years, and you wouldn't take the chance until you decided that you wanted to have at least as much money in your jeans as your wife did. Without Maddy, God only knows if we'd be where we are now, leading the current wave of software wunderkinds. So, yeah, I like her. I just don't like what she did to you when she left. I mean, you weren't exactly easy to live with for a while there, and you know how I feel about working eighteen-hour days.”

“Time and a half for overtime,” Joe said, smiling slightly. “Okay if it's you and me, but it really put a twist in your briefs when I started pushing everyone else that hard.” Then the smile faded. “Lar, what am I going to do? Losing Maddy once nearly killed me. I can't lose her again.”

“You haven't got her
to
lose her, buddy, not if she's about to marry someone else. And, if she loves him, you'd be the last person to interfere with her happiness. Right?”

“If she loves him,” Joe agreed, looking over the trees dividing the two properties, looking straight at the third-floor windows of Maddy's apartment. She wasn't there, because he'd seen her drive off earlier, but just being in the backyard, able to see her windows, somehow made him feel better. Man, he really was losing it! “But I don't think she does, Lar, that's the thing. I mean, okay, she loves him. But she's not
in love
with him.”

“Ah, the voice of sweet reason enters the conversation. Or would that be hopeful imagination?”

Sometimes Joe was happy that Larry was fourteen years his senior and, at forty-two, a saner, more levelheaded kind of guy—even if Maddy did privately call him Loony Larry. He'd kept Joe anchored through his most elaborate flights of fancy when developing their new software, even as he'd believed in Joe's ideas, encouraged him to dream. There was a
balance
about Larry Barry that just seemed to make it all work.

But there were times, like now, when Larry seemed to take on the role of Joe's long-absent father, using that simple seniority to make him feel ten years old. And selfish. And sometimes even dumb.

“I don't want her to make a mistake, Larry,” Joe said now, hoping his voice sounded reasonable, not mean-spirited. “A mistake that would ruin three lives.”

“Lives, hives,” Larry shot back across the wires. “Gee, they even rhyme. Like I said, I'm coming up there. Now, stop with the wishful thinking, and give me directions.”

“I didn't call you so you'd come running up here to hold my hand, Larry. I can take care of myself.”

“Then why did you call me, kid?”

Joe was silent for a few moments. He knew why he'd called Larry, the guy he trusted, the guy with the level head and a bean counter mentality mixed with a liberal dab of compassion and a mountain of cherished friendship. He wasn't Joe's father, but he had been part father-figure, right from the beginning. Joe couldn't deny that, didn't want to deny that. And, if anyone could keep his head on straight as his heart broke, Joe knew that man to be Larry Barry.

“You take the Northeast Extension of the Turnpike, and then…”

 

It was gone noon when Jessie and Ryan pulled up chairs at the long conference table and spread out hamburgers and French fries delivered from a local diner. They'd been at work since eight, gone through at least a gallon of coffee each and planned to work through the noon hour, straight on until six o'clock. Or later.

It wasn't due to the end of their fiscal year, or because of any emergency. It was just because that was how they'd always done it. Everything for the company, to the exclusion of most everything else, including their private lives. But it was a family company and they were the family.

Jessie picked up a nearly half-inch stack of pink memo slips and began paging through them as she chewed on a French fry. “You know, Ryan, you really do have to start returning your calls. Melissa, Joanne, Beth, Missy—wait, is that still Melissa?
Nope, different phone number—Althea. Ooh, ooh, ooh,
Althea.
I thought she told you to drop dead because you broke so many dates in order to work late?”

Ryan shook salt onto his hamburger. “She did. Last month. But they all want to know who I'm escorting to Maddy's wedding. I've had Jan taking messages for the past three days, while offering the information that I'm going stag. Not that anyone seems to be taking the hint. So, Jessie, about the Fuller contract—”

“You idiot! You don't
tell
women you're going stag to anything,” Jessie explained, tossing the phone messages into the trash. “That's like a red flag to a bull, or waving a candy bar under a kid's nose, or—”

“I think I get your point,” Ryan interrupted, sitting back in his chair, running a hand through his hair. “I'll tell Jan.”

“Do that,” Jessie said, nodding. “Now, tell me why you're going stag? I mean,” she ended with a gesture toward the trash can, “it's not like you couldn't get a date.”

“I don't know, Jessie,” he answered honestly. “I guess I'm just not in the mood to be fending off single ladies who want nothing more than to catch the next tossed bouquet.”

“You're working too hard, brother,” Jessie said, laughing. “I mean, you're
supposed
to be willing to catch all those lucky females for yourself, as they'll be in very
romantic
moods. Weddings are a single person's best friend, when it comes to looking forward to a night of romance.”

Ryan picked up a spreadsheet, pretended to study
it. “Oh, yeah? I had no idea you were such an expert on these things. And who are
you
bringing, Jessie? Last I heard, you were going stag, too, claiming you'd be too busy with your maid of honor duties.”

“We weren't talking about me,” Jessie said shortly, picking up a spreadsheet from the pile beside her. Another Chandler trait—when in doubt, or when unable to think of a good enough lie to turn away disturbing thoughts, questions, Chandlers went to work. “But we probably should talk about Allie. She says J. P. O'Malley is her date for the rehearsal dinner.”

“She wouldn't dare,” Ryan said, wincing. “Scratch that, yes, she would. Damn it, why can't she just back off, leave well enough alone, just this one time? Anyone would think she didn't like Matt, which is ridiculous, because she adores him. And she's
supposed
to like Maddy a little, too, not that you could tell that from the way she's running around, screwing up that poor kid's life. I have to tell you, Jessie, I haven't felt so sorry for anyone in my life. The kid's a mass of nerves.”

“Allie thinks she's doing it for the best,” Jessie said, barely able to believe she was defending her grandmother's actions. But then, she knew Almira wasn't just trying to help Maddy see the error of her ways. She was also meddling in Matt's life, in hers. And Jessie, evil and rotten as she knew it was, had been secretly rooting like hell for her grandmother ever since she figured out what the woman, and her accomplice, Mrs. Ballantine, were up to.

“Allie thinks she does everything for the best. Like setting me up for that blind date last month. What a miserable evening that was, for the both of
us. Although, come to think of it, since O'Malley showed up two days ago, she's been remarkably well-behaved. Now, if we only knew if that was a good thing or a bad thing.”

Jessie smiled weakly. “Or, thirdly, if we really want to know anything
at all.
”

M
addy finally drove home around three. She'd gone straight to the pharmacy to get her prescriptions filled, driven around aimlessly for about an hour because she couldn't think of anything better to do, then downed both pills with a bottle of spring water and a vegetarian, low-fat salad she'd picked at as she sat in a local restaurant, thinking over her life.

Was she supposed to take both pills at the same time? Linda had given her a bunch of instructions, and warnings, before Maddy had left the office, but she really hadn't been listening to her doctor with more than half an ear, even as she'd promised that she was hanging on every word.

Oh well, too late now, she thought, once again thinking about her life as she stabbed a large piece of romaine lettuce.

She had come to a few conclusions.

One, she was a mess. That was a given, consid
ering her hives, considering the way she'd turned into a soggy, weeping mess in Linda's office.

Two, she was going to continue to be a mess until she made up her mind, told the truth, took a stand and regained some semblance of control over her own life.

And three, hey, these pills were kinda neat.

They were so neat, in fact, that Maddy kept the radio off and her eyes-wide open on the thankfully short drive home, talking to herself the whole time, because she was feeling way too mellow to pay attention to traffic otherwise.

But, hey, her hives were gone. The itch was gone. And there was this lovely little
glow
around everything in her pretty screwed up world.

Nice. Very nice. Artificial. Temporary. But very, very nice. Once she'd parked the car with even more than her usual care, she slipped into the house, and finally let her defenses down, at last allowing the medications to have their lovely way with her.

“Hi, Allie, you sweet thing,” Maddy said as she all but waltzed into the main drawing room, her arms sort of floating somewhere at her sides, her grin wide, and happy for no reason at all. “How ya doin', Mrs. Ballantine? Shouldn't you two be in the kitchen, mixing up another witches' brew? I mean, you found Joe, brought him here to ruin my life. Maybe now you could conjure up Elvis, or pull a rabbit out of your ear. Pull a rabbit out of Elvis's ear?”

“Madeline Chandler,” Almira said, pulling her granddaughter over to the nearest couch and pushing her down into it. “Don't tell me you've been
drinking.
”

“Nope,” Maddy said, hoping her grin was rather Cheshire-like, mysterious. “
Thinking,
yes, but not drinking. And you know what I've been thinking? Do you want to know? Huh? Huh, huh, huh? Okay! I've been thinking that superficial isn't so bad. So there.”

“Coffee, right. Strong, black and lots of it,” Mrs. Ballantine said as Almira looked to her. She walked toward the hallway. “I'm already on it.”

“You know what I'm saying?” Maddy went on, oblivious to her grandmother's concern. “Superficial. Surface. No pain, no pain. That's how to be. No worrying, none of that guilt stuff, no crying…no decisions. Just, whee, isn't the sky a pretty blue, aren't those flowers just as red as red can be?”

She sighed, smiled, sagged against the couch cushions. “Nobody gets hurt, or if they do, I just don't notice. Especially about me. No pain, no pain. And Joe O'Malley can be as gorgeous and sexy and wonderful as he wants to be. I just don't care, so there.”

She looked up at her grandmother. “Are there any cookies left in the kitchen? I'm hungry for something sweet. Rabbits eat lettuce. Rabbits, and maybe Elvis. But I want sugar. I'm cute pudgy. Everybody says so.” She frowned slightly. “I don't know that Elvis was, though….” She brightened again. “But think of all the new employment opportunities for overweight men with sideburns.”

“Maybe she's having some sort of spell. Maybe I pushed too hard. I'm calling Linda Garvey, asking her to come over here,” Almira said to herself, walking past the heavy-lidded Maddy as she headed for the nearest phone.

Ten minutes later, Maddy was sitting up with no small amount of help from Mrs. Ballantine while Almira spoon-fed her strong, black coffee.

“So, yes, it turns out Dr. Garvey already saw Maddy in her office this morning,” Almira explained calmly, for the second time. “For the hives, you understand. Linda says lack of sleep probably combined with the medicines to put the poor thing over the edge, although she wasn't supposed to take the other medication until she got home.”

“Do you think she listened?” Mrs. Ballantine asked, her voice incongruously soft and caring. Not at all the drill sergeant.

“We both rather think she didn't listen to Linda too well,” Almira told Mrs. Ballantine as Maddy grinned, and slurped coffee, and then began singing snatches of a song that had something to do with the moon and blue and June. “And it would seem Maddy's system doesn't handle some medications as well as others. So, first a little coffee, then bed, then no more doses of anything but the antihistamine. Linda said a few hours of uninterrupted sleep is the best cure for everything that ails Maddy right now, not that I could get the woman to tell me just what is ailing Maddy, except for the hives.”

“Bed,” Maddy said on a sigh, leaning her head against Mrs. Ballantine's arm. “‘Perchance to dream…'”

Mrs. Ballantine, in full Mother Lion mode, snorted disdainfully. “You really had to ask?
You're
what's bothering Miss Maddy, Mrs. Chandler. You and your meddling and scheming. That's as plain as the nose on my face. I'm embarrassed to be a part of it.”

Almira winced. “Your nose, huh? And God knows that's plain enough. Yes, well, she'll be fine with a few hours sleep. There's been no real harm done.”

“What had she been taking? Only antihistamines?” Mrs. Ballantine asked as she carefully laid Maddy down on the couch, removed her shoes, covered her with a cashmere throw. Maddy began to snore. “Did Dr. Garvey say?”

Almira, who knew darn full well Linda must have prescribed some sort of nerve pill for her youngest, most volatile grandchild, but who still needed the protective Mrs. Ballantine as her ally in the Marriage Wars, said only, “I didn't ask, and she didn't say. Probably some sort of double-dose for the hives and the itching. There, she's asleep. We'll let her rest for a while before we put stage two of our plan into effect.”

Mrs. Ballantine ruffled up like a huge black crow about to let loose with a great big squawk. “I can't condone this, Mrs. Chandler. I've gone this far, but to go further? Look at her,” she commanded, flinging out one wing…er,
arm
…to indicate the softly snoring Maddy. “She's down and out, miserable. Confused. Falling apart.”

Almira looked at her granddaughter. “Yes, you're right, Mrs. Ballantine. She's all of that. And I can't think of a better time to give her another gentle push.”

“Where to? Off a cliff?”

“No, you fainthearted excuse for a conspirator. Not off a cliff. Straight into Joe O'Malley's arms, where we both know she belongs. She does, too, although she won't admit it.”

“You're that sure?”

“I'm that sure,” Almira said, handing Mrs. Ballantine the coffee cup. She walked out of the room, head held high, before the housekeeper could see the worried frown she couldn't hide. She wanted this over, now. Sooner than now. Before she began to doubt what she was doing.

 

Maddy woke as the small brass mantel clock chimed the hour of four. She lay on her back for a few minutes, wondering how on earth she'd ended up on the sofa with a soft cashmere throw over her. The logical conclusion was that she'd come home, laid down and taken a nap. Which was very odd, because she never took naps.

The pills,
she realized a few moments later, wincing at her own stupidity. Well, that certainly answered the question of whether or not she'd been supposed to take both of them at the same time, didn't it?

Still, she felt so rested, so much more calm, even a little bit in control of herself. After the events of the past two days, that was really saying something.

“Ah, you're awake,” Almira said from somewhere in the room, and Maddy looked across the wide expanse to see her grandmother walking toward her. “I've been sitting here, trying to understand how any granddaughter of mine could possibly snore. Must have gotten it from your mother's side, that's all I can say.”

Maddy pushed a lock of hair out of her face. “I do
not
snore,” she countered in sudden embarrassment. “Do I?”

“Only when drugged, I'd imagine,” Almira told
her, making scooting motions with her right hand, so that Maddy put her feet on the floor, leaving room on the sofa for her grandmother to sit down beside her. “Now, are we going to talk about this, or are we going to pretend it never happened? I'm open to either one, although I will tell you, just to be fair, that I've already spoken to Linda Garvey.”

“You
did?
She did? She talked to you? But she promised she wouldn't—” Maddy was fully awake now, completely alert. “Oh, wait a minute. Wait just one darn minute. You're on a fishing expedition, aren't you, Allie? Linda didn't tell you anything.”

“Busted,” Almira said, grinning as she leaned over to kiss Maddy's cheek. “But I am a pretty good guesser. Don't take any more of those pills, darling, because you don't really need them. Not for what ails you right now anyway. They only hide problems, they don't solve them. Only you can solve them. You're lucky that way. You
do
know what your problems are, don't you?”

Maddy got to her feet, stretched as she smiled down at Almira. “You mean after
you,
Allie?” she asked. “I mean, world peace would be easier to achieve than trying to keep you from meddling in my life.”

“Thank you, darling,” Almira said as she, too, rose, “but don't give me too much credit. You're doing a pretty good job of complicating your life yourself, aren't you?”

Maddy wasn't about to admit anything of the kind, true as it was. Instead she spread her arms wide, then dropped them firmly to her sides once more, saying, “Well, that was fun. My turn again, I believe. New subject, please.”

“Same subject, new problem,” Almira said, retrieving her purse and car keys from a nearby table. “I promised Joe I'd wait for the television cable person to come sometime between four and six today. And I would have, except that Jessie phoned and said I have to come down to the plant and sign a few things. Quarterly bonus checks for our best employees, I believe, so I imagine I shouldn't put it off until tomorrow.”

She reached into the pocket of her rose pink linen suit, extracted a single key, the one Maddy recognized as being their emergency key to the Harris house. “Joe's in Philadelphia, doing big shot computer genius things, I suppose, and won't be home until late tonight, so you're safe.”

Maddy took the key, looked at it as if it might turn into a finger-eating lizard or something. “Let me get this straight.
You
volunteered to house-sit while waiting for the cable guy?
You?
Uh-huh,” she said, holding out the key. “Not buying that one, Allie, not this time. You wouldn't even baby-sit us kids, let alone a house.”

Almira put on her “stern” face, one she didn't wear often. “I don't have time to stand here and listen to some litany of my shortcomings before your parents died, or whatever it is you're trying to say, or attempting to blame on me. Go over there and wait, or stay here. I really couldn't care less.”

She strode out of the room, not looking back, leaving Maddy still holding the key.

“Well,” Maddy said to no one in particular, “if I didn't know the woman so well, I'd think I just insulted her.”

“You said something, Miss Maddy?” Mrs. Bal
lantine asked, coming into the room, carrying a large feather duster with her, trailing it over pieces of furniture as she went. “How are you feeling?”

“Oh, I'm fine, thank you. Really much better,” Maddy said, and realized that she was right. She did feel better. Sharper. Sharp enough to see a trick when it was presented to her. “I'm supposed to go next door to wait for the cable guy to hook up Mr. O'Malley's television cable, but I don't think I want to. But you think I should go, don't you?”

“Me?” Mrs. Ballantine asked, shaking her head. “Why would I care about something like that, Miss Maddy? But, if you don't have time, I'll be happy to do it for you. I'd like to see what Mr. O'Malley has done with the place so far. Ask me, he should paint all those dark walls white, and start from there.”

“You…you'd go in my place?”

“It
is
cold-cuts night, remember? I have nothing much to do here anyway, as we won't be serving in the dining room.”

Was Mrs. Ballantine telling the truth? About the cold-cuts, sure. But what about being willing to take Maddy's place? Was she being nice, or was she being devious? Had Allie put the woman up to this whole charade? Was it a charade?

Did she care?

“Never mind, Mrs. Ballantine,” Maddy said, already heading out of the room. “I'll take care of it.”

“Very good, Miss Maddy,” Mrs. Ballantine called after her, then weakly subsided into a chair. This intrigue and reverse-psychology stuff wasn't easy….

 

If she'd been sent over to Joe's to spy on him, report back what he'd done to the Harris house, Maddy would have precious little to say. There was furniture in a few of the downstairs rooms, but other than in the living room, the furniture was just sort of piled up here and there, awaiting arranging.

Jessie had helped in the living room. She'd done a good job. A really good job. Maddy stood with her chin in her hand, admiring the scene for long moments through the eyes of a woman who'd scored an
A
in her Interior Design class, then deliberately moved the blue chair closer to the window. “Better,” she said, knowing she was being petty.