Thirty-Two and a Half Complications (10 page)

“Nah. I had something from Merilee’s delivered. What about you? Don’t tell me you had canned soup again.”

I grimaced. “I had some crackers and tea. All this fuss has been messing with my stomach.”

Worry filled his eyes. “Are you feeling all right?” He lifted the back of his hand to my forehead.

I pulled his hand down and kissed his palm. “I’m fine. Just too much excitement.”

“This excitement seems pretty tame for you.” He gave me a wry smile. “Do you feel like eating something now? You didn’t eat much lunch either.”

“Maybe I’ll make a sandwich.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“You need to prop up your foot. You’ve done a lot of standing and walking today. The doctor’s liable to make you use crutches again.”

“God forbid,” he grumbled. “How about I sit with you and put my foot up on a chair? I’ve missed you, Rose. I want to be with you.”

“Okay,” I smiled, heading for the kitchen.

He hobbled behind me and froze in the doorway. “What happened to the window?”

I explained while Mason sat down, casting a glance at the gallon-size plastic bag that covered the opening with duct tape. “Maybe you should get an alarm system,” he said, scowling. “You were lucky it was Joe this time. Next time…”

“There won’t be a next time.” I pulled out a jar of peanut butter and a knife. “Besides, I can’t afford an alarm system right now.”

“Then let me pay for it. I’m living here right now too, Rose. You wouldn’t let me help pay for your moving costs. Let me help with something.”

“You can help pay for the food for Thanksgiving.”

“
Rose.
”

I pulled a plate out of the cabinet and put everything I’d need for my sandwich on the kitchen table next to Mason. “I’ll think about it, okay?” I had no problem letting him help with the utilities and food, but I didn’t feel comfortable letting him pay for something so permanent, not when he was planning to move out. “Did you find out anything about Mr. Sullivan?”

He gave me an ornery grin. “Now you know that’s official business that I shouldn’t comment on.”

I stopped opening the peanut butter jar, my hand still on the lid, and lifted my eyebrows. “But…?”

“But there was no sign of him at his home and his car’s missing. It looks like he left his house in a hurry. Drawers open and clothes strewn around. He pretty much cleared out his bank account.”

“You think he left town?”

“Sure looks that way.”

“Do you think he took my money with him?”

“Honestly, Rose, I have no idea, but he was known for his foot-loose and fancy-free attitude toward loans over the last few months. The bank manager now suspects he was embezzling money.”

I sighed.
I’d
gotten a loan from Mr. Sullivan. Did that mean more trouble for my business? “I won’t be able to eat lunch with you tomorrow. I’m meeting Neely Kate.”

“Why don’t you see if she has any info on the bank robbery suspects,” he teased. “I swear the Henryetta police would close more cases if they kept her on retainer.”

“Better yet,” I grinned and licked the peanut butter off my knife, “maybe she and I should form our own investigation agency.”

“If you did, you’d put them out of business in a week.”

As much as I distrusted them, I had to admit it was tempting.

***

The next afternoon, I arrived at Merilee’s at noon to meet Neely Kate. Whenever we made plans for lunch, she usually arrived first, eager to leave the office she hated. But today she was conspicuously absent. I glanced at my phone to check the time and make sure she hadn’t called or texted to cancel, but there was nothing. So I got a table and waited several minutes until she came through the door, looking paler and thinner than I was used to seeing her. Just how bad was her morning sickness?

I stood as she slid toward me down the narrow aisle between the tables. “Neely Kate, have you been to the doctor lately?”

Her mouth puckered with disapproval at my question, but she sat down without commenting.

I took my seat again and leaned across the table, lowering my voice. “How much weight have you lost?”

She studied me for several seconds. “Eight pounds. I thought you were supposed to gain weight when you had a baby,” she said, forcing a laugh.

“Neely Kate, I’m worried about you.”

“I’m fine. I’m telling you that morning sickness is a good sign. Even the doctor says so.”

Guilt washed over me. I hadn’t noticed the extent of her sickness because I’d been a terrible friend lately. Neely Kate and I used to have lunch several times a week before Mason and I got together, but lately I’d been eating lunch with him nearly every day since he worked so late at night. Without meaning to, I’d neglected my best friend.

A waitress checked on us and Neely Kate ordered a bowl of chicken noodle soup while I ordered two salads—one for me and one to go.

“For Mason?” Neely Kate asked.

“He gets so busy he forgets to eat lunch if I don’t bring it to him. It’s a wonder he didn’t starve to death before we started seeing each other.”

“Nah,” she laughed. “He was too busy eating lunch here hoping to run into you.”

I blushed. I suspected she was right.

She winked. “Besides, all the waitresses here have a crush on him. They would have brought him food just to get a chance to flirt with him.”

I knew that had to be true too. I was thankful they didn’t seem to harbor a grudge against me.

“How are your sessions with Jonah going?”

“Great. In fact, I have one with him later this afternoon.”

“I bet you have a lot to tell him about the bank robbery. What’s going on with the case?” she asked, playing with a strand of her hair.

“It’s looking pretty likely that Mr. Sullivan had a part in it. He appears to have left town.”

“But he wasn’t one of the robbers?”

“No, I’m sure of it.”

“So that means there’s two guys still out there besides the loan officer.”

“Guess so.” I told her about Joe’s shenanigans, and how it had caught me off guard to realize how much time he’d been spending with Violet and the kids.

“I don’t trust him,” she said, taking a sip of the soup the waitress had brought out.

“I don’t either, but I’m not sure what to do. I’ve done a great job of avoiding him for the past couple of weeks since he came back to Henryetta. Besides, I agreed to be friends with him.”

Her mouth gaped open. “Why on earth would you do such a thing?”

“Because he’s being persistent in his attempts to win me back and this way he’ll at least back off.”

She shook her head, her mouth puckering with disapproval. “That’s never gonna work.”

“That’s what Mason said, but he told me he was gonna leave it up to me.” I sighed. “It’s the best way to handle it. I’m stuck with him until they catch the bank robbers.”

“So why wait for someone else to do it? Let’s catch them ourselves.”

I laughed. “I suggested to Mason that you and I should form our own detective agency and he said we’d put the HPD out of business in a week.”

“Then let’s do it.” She looked halfway serious.

I choked on a bite of my salad. “I didn’t know pregnancy made expectant mothers delusional.”

Neely Kate rolled her eyes.

“How on earth would you propose we do
that?
”

“Your visions, of course.” She shook her head and lifted her spoon. “You know that you don’t use them
nearly
enough.”

“Who do you propose I have a vision
of
? Should I wander up and down the street with a sign asking people if I can touch them to see if they know the robbers? Or maybe I should just hang out at the Trading Post bar out on Highway 84 and have visions of their patrons?”

“Of course not.” She waved her hand. “The sign part would be way too conspicuous and I suspect you’d probably better stay away from the Trading Post for good. Maybe Skeeter Malcolm’s pool hall.”

I dropped my fork into the bowl with a clang. “You’re serious.”

“Well, not about the
sign
part, but us finding them? Yeah, I am.” She set down her spoon. “Then once this case is closed, you can go back to making goo-goo eyes at Mason without Joe getting in the way.” She tilted her head to the side and added, “Besides, look how many cases you’ve solved without hardly trying. Imagine what we could do if you put your mind to it.”

She did have a point. “Do you think we can get my money back?”

She lifted her eyebrows, an excited gleam in her eye. “If I say yes, will you try to find out who they are?”

“Maybe.” I really needed that cash back.

“The guy in your vision said they didn’t have enough money. They’re probably saving it up for something. As long as they haven’t robbed any other places yet, I bet they still have it.”

“But I wouldn’t even know where to start looking for these guys.”

“The best place to start is with that gold Charger. Too bad you don’t still work at the DMV. Do you have any friends left there?”

I exhaled my disappointment. “No. Not really.”

“Joe could look it up, but then I suspect he already has if Mason told him about the car.”

“Asking Joe for help is not an option.” I shook my head adamantly. “First, I don’t want to talk to him and two, he wouldn’t want me to get involved. He got irate because I
looked
at the bank robbers to get their description.” My stomach churned, so I grabbed the package of crackers that had come with my salad. “He’d have a coronary if he knew I was digging into any of this.”

“So we’re back where we started,” she said. “You need to try to have some visions.”

My eyes widened with an epiphany. “Wait, Neely Kate. I have another idea… Bruce Wayne used to work at Crocker’s mechanics shop. Even though the shop served as a front for his pot business and the stolen car parts ring, the mechanic shop was legit. If these robbers are part of the less-than-savory life of Fenton County, I bet they would have gotten parts for the Charger there at some point.”

“But I thought Bruce Wayne pissed them all off when he turned his back on Crocker to save you.”

“He pissed some of them off,” I admitted. “But Crocker was so crazy at the end that plenty of the guys wanted to ship him back to prison themselves.”

“So do you think that Bruce Wayne can look into that for us?”

“I’m not sure,” I said, trying to eat another bite of my salad.

“Well, it’s a place to start, right? And you won’t know unless you ask him.”

“True.” I pushed the plate to the side and took a drink of my water.

Her eyes narrowed. “Why aren’t you eating? You usually have the appetite of a wild boar.”

“My stomach’s been a mess the last week,” I said. “I don’t know what’s wrong. It must be all the excitement.”

Neely Kate gave me an ornery grin. “If you weren’t on the pill, I’d think you were pregnant too.”

My chest tightened and I struggled to find the breath to talk. “I’m not on the pill right now. I didn’t have my pill pack with me during the whole Crocker mess. I went for so many days without them that the doctor told me to restart them after my next period.”

Her smile fell. “And you haven’t started your period yet?”

“Well…no.”

“Did you and Mason…
you know
…while you were hiding out at the farm?”

My face turned red. “Well…yeah…”

“And you didn’t use any other protection?”

The sick feeling in my stomach got worse. “Not until I got back home.”

“Rose, that was weeks ago.”

“Oh, crappy doodles.” My head felt faint. “I was supposed to start at the beginning of the week.”

“It’s only Friday. That’s just a few days.”

“But I’m
never
late.”

“You’re pale as a ghost and look like you’re about to pass out. Lay your head down on the table.”

I shook my head, forcing myself to take slow, steady breaths. “Oh, God.”

She reached across the table and grabbed my hand. “Rose, calm down. It’s probably nothing.”

I nodded. She was right. It was probably nothing.

But what if it was
something?

Chapter Eight

Neely Kate grabbed her wallet out of her purse and laid several bills on the table before standing and pulling me to my feet. “Come on.”

I stared at her, still in shock. “What about Mason’s salad?”

“We’ll get it later,” she said, dragging me to the front door, only stopping for a moment to holler at the waitress that we’d back in a bit for our order. She didn’t drop her hold on me until she’d tugged me across the street to the park bench next to the courthouse. After pushing me down on the seat, she sat down next to me. “I understand why you’re shocked, but I need to know why this is freaking you out so much.”

“Everything. Mason and I…we’re so new…”

“Do you want kids?”

I flinched in surprise. “Of course I want kids! I’ve wanted kids since I was practically a kid myself. Joe and I had even started dreaming about a family…” My voice choked off as tears slid down my cheeks.

Neely Kate wrapped her arm around me and pulled my head onto her shoulder. “It’s gonna be okay. You’re probably not even pregnant. Maybe you’re late because of all the excitement, not to mention that the pill sometimes screws with your hormones.”

“Yeah.” I nodded. “That’s probably it.”

“But if you
are
pregnant—” she wiped my tears and gave me a warm smile “—I can guarantee you that Mason Deveraux would be a wonderful father.”

I grinned through my tears. “Yeah, he would.”

“He’ll stand with you in this, no matter how it turns out. But the first thing you need to do is take a pregnancy test.”

I nodded. She was right, but I wasn’t sure I was ready to know yet. If I found out I was pregnant, I’d need to tell Mason right away. Selfishly, I wanted the two of us to have more time alone together without planning for a baby. I hardly saw him as it was. But even more than that, I’d always thought about pregnancy as a positive, happy thing. When I found out I was having a baby—either now or in the future—I wanted my tears to be from happiness, not worry and sorrow. I’d spent my entire life knowing I wasn’t wanted by one of my parents, so it was important to me that any child of mine be loved and cherished from the very moment I knew for sure about his or her existence. I needed some time to wrap my head around the possibility first.