The Lone Star Lonely Hearts Club (21 page)

Almost made me teary-eyed to think I’d ever leave, that someday I’d want something larger, roomy enough for a husband and a family. A house with a fence and a backyard big enough for a swing set.

Somebody, stop me!
I was sounding like my prep school chums, who’d been full of plans for catching a man and settling down, even when they were mere teens.

I’d always wanted to live my life differently, to strike out a path that was unique, where I surrounded myself only with the closest of friends, those I could trust, forever following my passion, unconcerned with what others thought of me. It had taken much of my (nearly) thirty-one years for me to form my own identity outside of my family, and I couldn’t fathom forsaking that for anyone or anything.

Even for Malone?

Hmmm.

Were love and independence incompatible? I wondered, thinking that didn’t seem right or fair. I felt uneasy with the idea of giving up even part of myself, when getting to where I was had been such a struggle. Which is why, after three months with Brian, I still hadn’t offered him a key to my condo. The idea of letting go of that control made my pulse race. My own personal fear factor.

Would I ever be able to do it? Would I be able to share enough of myself to be able “to have and to hold, until death do us part”?

My mother had married when she was just twenty-one and straight out of SMU. She’d never known what it was like to be alone until my father had died. And that was hardly the same as starting out that way, leaving college and having only yourself to account for.

By and large, no one constantly asked me, “Where’ve you been?” Or demanded that I play my music lower, or change the TV channel to
Monday Night Football
. Every choice was mine to make. I had plenty of personal space, and I didn’t want to lose it.

I thought of Bebe Kent and Sarah Lee Sewell, women of my mother’s generation who had wed so young, too, and I felt a sudden rage in my belly that they had died right at the point where, as Mother had put it, they were coming into their own.

What if someone had deliberately stolen that from them?

What if Cissy wasn’t delusional? What if she was right about everything, and the rest of us were in denial?

If that was the case, how could I even think of preventing her from learning the truth? No matter how silly or crazy I thought she was for doing it.

The answer was easy.
I couldn’t.

I dropped my forehead to the steering wheel and banged it gently, wondering what I was getting myself into and hoping I wasn’t doing my mother harm by supporting her crusade instead of refusing.

Tap, tap, tap.

I jumped at the sound of knuckles rapping the window and jerked my head around to find Charlie Tompkins smiling at me through the glass. As I caught my breath, I shut off the ignition and pulled my key out. Charlie stepped back, so I could open the door and hop down, drawing my satchel out after me.

His daughter’s Beamer was pulling out of my space, and my neighbor nodded in that direction. “I told her not to park there, Andy, but you know how young women are. Woo doggie, but they don’t listen to nobody. Particularly to us menfolk.”

“No problem,” I assured him, rolling the window down a crack before I shut and locked the door.

“You need some help?” he asked, though he had a leash caught in one hand, his elderly beagle tugging on the cord gently as he sniffed my Wrangler’s tires. I could only hope he’d save his business for the grass.

“I’m good, Charlie, thanks,” I assured him and smiled back. I stepped up the curb onto the sidewalk, and he followed.

“You young women got a thing for doing things your own selves, don’t ya?” He tugged on the lead, and his potbellied canine followed him onto the small patch of lawn. “Bet you don’t even let a fellow open a door for ya.”

“Well, you’d lose that bet,” I said, and he laughed.

He had one of those great faces, chiseled with lines that he’d earned working oil rigs most of his life and capped with white hair, twisted onto his brow by a stubborn cowlick. His grizzled twang was the real thing, not the cheap imitation my mother kept taking a stab at as her alias, Miriam.

Charlie and his low-rider beagle walked me to my door, which was right next to his. We reached the portico, when I stopped and turned to him.

“Oh, hey, I have to leave for a few days,” I said.

“Business?”

“More like a minor family crisis. Still, if you could keep an eye on things, Charlie, and make sure my mail doesn’t overflow the box while I’m gone. I’m hoping I might get home some in-between”—
In between what? Chasing my mother around a retirement facility
—“but I may not be able to slip away so easily.”

“No trouble a’tall, sweetheart,” he drawled and patted his pants pocket, eliciting a jingle. “Got your spare right on my ring. So I’ll go ahead and take your mail inside when it’s delivered.”

Yep, the eighty-year-old retiree next door had my key, but my boyfriend did not. How was that for having my priorities in order?

“You got any plants to water?” he asked.

“Just this one out front, thanks, Charlie,” I said and bent to lay a pat on his doggie’s back, when the critter decided to lift his leg and pee on the pot of chrysanthemums sitting on the front steps.

Nothing like the smell of fresh piddle in the morning.

“Oops, sorry, Andy. Guess ol’ Bubba figured he’d water ’em for ya.”

The story of my life.

“It’s okay, Charlie. They were gonna die sometime anyway.”

“Happens to all of us, sooner or later,” he remarked and pinched a kerchief from his shirt pocket to dab at his slick forehead.

“Dying?” I asked, a topic that was much on my mind of late.

“Well, that, too.” He let out a throaty chuckle. “But I meant getting pissed on.”

“Oh, yeah, of course.”

There was nothing so blunt as the straight-shooting philosophy of a native Texan.

Bubba set to sniffing my foot, so I gave Charlie a smile and a “see you later,” before I stuck my key in the lock, escaping inside before the beagle could get a leg up on me, so to speak.

The first thing I did when I got past the front door was to drop my bulging tote bag on the ground and drink in the familiar surroundings. I took a loving whiff of air, inhaling a pinch of vanilla candle, a smidge of lime from Malone’s aftershave, and the faint bouquet of burnt toast. My gaze embraced the walls that wrapped around me, wearing treasured artwork I’d rescued from flea markets and garage sales, mixed amongst my own creations: blurry watercolors mimicking Monet’s
Garden in Giverny
and not a few acrylic landscapes paying homage to Cezanne.

Mimicking. Homage.

I was a copycat, wasn’t I? Getting my inspiration elsewhere.

The reason I’d gone into Web design, forsaking a more Bohemian lifestyle, was because I’d known early on that my style of art was . . . well, not exactly my own. But I hadn’t given up uncovering my creative core, and my latest attempt on canvas was propped on a slim easel near the best-lit window, in the room’s far corner. A density of brooding color, heavy on texture and brushstrokes, more emotion than precision.

It was my first real attempt in a long while to put myself out there, to forget who I was
supposed
to be and paint like the real Andy.

“Have no fear of perfection, you’ll never reach it.”

Hello, Dali
, I mused, as his quote came to mind.
I’m trying, Salvador. I’m trying.

But first things first.

I blew out a rough breath—one that sorely needed a hit of Listerine—and I headed straight for the bathroom. In my haste to catch up to Mother this morning, I’d barely had time to brush my teeth.

Once I had my pearly whites polished, I stepped into the shower, scrubbing skin, shampooing hair and shaving my legs smooth as a whistle. Then I let the water pelt my shoulders as I stood there, chin down, closing my eyes and willing myself not to think of much of anything. I could’ve stayed there forever, until I’d shriveled to the size of a raisin.

Only I couldn’t. I had things to do, no matter how ambivalent I felt about doing them.

After dressing in a clean pair of jeans and a T-shirt, I padded to the kitchen to whip up a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on wheat, throwing in a few pretzel sticks and a big glass of chocolate soy milk on the side.

My definition of a gourmet meal.

I sat down on the couch to eat, pulling the envelope Annabelle had given me from my bag and laying out the papers beside my sandwich plate. Without more than a cursory glance at the slick brochures for Belle Meade—with a fold-out map where she’d highlighted the library—and a groan when I saw my “Volunteer” badge had an awful old photo laminated on it, one Mother must’ve provided to Annabelle. I looked like a full-grown chipmunk: big teeth, big cheeks.

The card key for Belle Meade slipped out as I gave the envelope a final shake to empty it, and I hesitated before I stuck it into my purse.

Anyone who volunteered or worked at the retirement village got one of those things, as did all the residents. Or anyone the residents put on their “regular visitors” list, like Cissy, who still had one of Bebe’s spares.

So how did the place keep tabs on everyone who had access? Not that security did such a swift job of monitoring those who came and went. The guardhouse had been unmanned when I’d driven past it this morning, and Sam—or Bob—had let the Bentley through yesterday with only a cursory nod.

Sure, they had cameras at the entrance and at the front door to the Manor, and I had to figure someone was watching a set of screens somewhere, or at least keeping tapes to view if and when anything unusual happened.

Annabelle had said herself:

“. . . our security team found no signs of foul play, no indication of a forced entry. Nothing in the house was disturbed or appeared to be missing.”

So if no one had noticed anything or anyone out of the ordinary on the grounds of Belle Meade the nights Bebe and Sarah Lee had died, did that mean nothing had happened? Or had the killer flown under the radar, as Mother suggested, which would point to an inside job, wouldn’t it? Someone who knew the territory and the daily patterns of the residents, then had carefully zeroed in on particular, vulnerable targets.

Like one of the staff members who’d been with Annabelle “from the beginning” and who knew about Bebe and Sarah Lee threatening to sue.

Listen to you, Kendricks. Can you hear yourself?

Oh, Lord, I was channeling Cissy.

I swallowed a thick lump of bread and peanut butter, finished off my pretzels and soymilk, and left the dishes in the sink.

Time to rock and roll.

The clock was ticking, and this sidekick was on duty.

A
fter I’d emptied my tote bag, put away my black slides, and tossed the dirty clothes into the hamper, I caught the phone as it was ringing.

“Andy!”

The voice that squawked my name belonged to none other than Janet Graham, my redheaded pal who knew enough about my youthful indiscretions to write a book called,
When Good Debs Go Bad
. Though she preferred to pen stories about the snooty social set for the
Park Cities Press
. Lucky for me.

“You never returned my call,” she reprimanded. “I even left my cell on vibrate during the Kappa Kappa Gamma Tablescapes benefit at the country club in case you buzzed back.”

“Oh, poo, I’m sorry. It completely slipped my mind. I was actually at my mother’s last night.” I slid onto the sofa with my old Princess phone. “It’s just been a maddening couple of days.”

“How is Cissy? I know she and Bebe were tight as ticks, and she looked less than her usual
über
-composed self at the service yesterday morning. Don’t tell me she’s questioning the meaning of life and has shucked her Chanel for a potato sack?”

For an instant, I panicked, thinking she knew something about Cissy’s crazy crusade at Belle Meade, because Janet had a way of finding out about everything—or nearly—if it involved the Dallas elite.

“She’s coping in her own unique fashion,” I said carefully. “But, you’re right, it’s been tough for her to lose two friends like that.”

“
Two
friends?” Janet echoed, and I winced. Guess she hadn’t heard about Sarah Lee Sewell yet, and I wasn’t about to fill her in. “Someone else from Cissy’s circle passed?”

“Um, maybe I misspoke”—there went my foot-in-mouth disease again—“How’s your tribute to Mrs. Kent going?” I tried to steer the subject away from serial dead blue bloods as fast as I could.

“I just sent that sucker to my editor, as a matter of fact. It’ll go in Tuesday’s edition, along with a profile of Bethany Entwhistle. Do you know her, Andy? She’s a former Symphony Deb taking over the reigns of the Art for AIDS Foundation.”

“Little blonde who sounds like she swallowed helium?” I’d met her at a fundraiser for local children’s charities that Mother had dragged me to last year.”

“That’s the one,” Janet drawled. “Get this”—she cleared her throat—“when I asked what three historical figures she’d like most to have dinner with, she answered, ‘Jesus Christ, Mother Teresa, and Britney Spears.’”

“No way!”

“It’s true, I swear.” I could imagine Janet, sitting at her cubicle in the
Press
offices, her orange-red hair stuck up with chopsticks or butterfly clips, trying hard not to giggle as she interviewed the simpleminded Ms. Entwhistle. “And how about this, Andy. Her favorite animals are her Chihuahuas, Neiman and Marcus, whom she apparently loves to dress up in tailor-made outfits. We got a shot of them wearing black leather Gucci jackets and matching biker caps.”

I couldn’t speak; I was guffawing so loudly.

“I thought you’d appreciate that one.”

I wiped tears from my eyes. “Oh, God, and that’s the kind of girl my mother always dreamed I’d become.”

“Wait, sweetie, I didn’t even tell you the best part. Guess who she’d want to play her if a movie was ever made of her life?” To which Janet added the aside, “
As if
.”

“If it’s not Julia Roberts then it’s gotta be . . .”