Further Confessions of a Slightly Neurotic Hitwoman (22 page)

“Maggie’s right,” he said slowly. “Why would you invite her if you didn’t want to see her?”

“But what if . . . ?” Alice’s lower lip quivered.

“You’re going to ruin your makeup if you start to cry,” I teased gently.

“What if she still doesn’t . . . ?”

“No one forced her to come here today,” Zeke said. “She obviously wants to see you too.”

Alice looked to me for confirmation.

I nodded. “She got all dressed up in a pretty dress. She’s sober. She asked nicely.”

“Let her in,” Alice said to me, grabbing Zeke’s hand.

I opened the door. Ellen, eyes downcast, didn’t even look up at me. “Come in, Ellen.”

Slowly she raised her head and I saw that tears had already furrowed their way down her cheeks. I reached out and touched her elbow and offered her a reassuring smile. “Come on in.”

She followed me in with faltering steps. I moved to the side so that mother and daughter could see one another for the first time in years.

“You look beautiful,” Ellen said, her voice shaking.

“Mommy!” Letting go of Zeke, Alice threw herself into her mother’s arms. They both sobbed loudly as they held one another.

Feeling my own eyes growing moist, I looked over at Zeke. Hands balled into fists, he’d turned away from the reunion. My heart squeezed painfully at the sight of his distress.

As though he sensed me watching him, he pivoted to look at me, something sharp and accusing in his gaze.

I took a step back, prepared for him to launch some sort of attack, but then his expression morphed to such extreme regret that I found myself moving toward him. I didn’t know what to say to make him feel better, but I desperately wanted to do something to show him that while his mother might have rejected him, his friends never would.

Throwing my arms around him, I squeezed as tightly as I could.

“Ow!” he exclaimed.

I jumped away.

“My boutonniere stabbed me,” he said, pulling me back to him, and crushing me in an embrace.

“Are you okay?” I whispered after a long moment, ignoring the giggles and exclamations of Alice and Ellen.

“Coming back here was so much more challenging than I expected,” he admitted with a heavy sigh.

“I’m sorry.”

“You should be. You’re one of the biggest complications,” he muttered.

“Me?”

“You’ve got to stop that, Maggie. You’re killing me.”

“Stop what?”

“Looking like you care so much.”

I straightened his bow tie. “But I do care.”

“And that’s a complication.”

Before I could ask him why, Alice said, “Could you find the photographer? I’d like her to take a picture of me and my mom.”

“Sure,” Zeke said a tad too quickly, and bounded out of the room as though he were glad of the excuse to escape.

After the pictures were taken, Ellen went to join the other guests and the wedding party was lined up for the processional.

“Are you sure you know what to do?” Alice asked nervously.

I adjusted her veil. “Yes, and besides, no one will be watching anyone except you.”

“Does this dress make me look pregnant?” She smoothed her hand over her still-flat belly.

“You look beautiful.”

She touched my mother’s necklace where it lay against her collarbone. “You were right about my mom.”

“I’m glad things have worked out for you.”

“I hope they work out for you too.”

The processional began to play.

“Showtime!” I gave her a quick hug and then was a total pro lockstepping down the aisle behind Zeke.

The ceremony was lovely; quick, sweet, and the perfect showcase for two people deeply in love. Watching Lamont’s adoration of his bride made me wonder why she’d ever had second thoughts.

I glanced at Zeke a couple of times during the ceremony. Slight frown lines wrinkled his brow and his jaw was clenched tightly, even though he had a polite smile plastered on throughout. Something was definitely bugging him. I wasn’t sure if it was me or his mother, but I vowed to get to the bottom of it during the reception.

The groom kissed the bride, everyone applauded, and we all walked into the cocktail hour.

“There’s no salmon,” I said as we entered the room.

“What?” the groomsman, a friend of Lamont’s from college, whose arm I was hanging on, asked.

“There’s no salmon.” The room was done in lovely shades of lavender and gray.

Behind me, Zeke chuckled. “Now do you believe me?”

Turning, I glared at him. “So what am I supposed to be? The comic relief in the butt-ugly dress?”

The groomsman sidled away.

“You’re a cliché,” Zeke said, taking my arm and leading me deeper into the room. “Brides have been dressing their competition in ugly dresses since the beginning of time. Consider it a compliment. Champagne?”

I could have really used a drink at that point, but had to stay sharp if I was going to kill a man that night. I shook my head.

“Wine?”

“Seltzer,” I said.

Zeke frowned.

“What? You’re opposed to carbonated drinks?”

“You’re not . . . ?” he asked.

“Not what?”

“Armani said you didn’t drink at Foxy’s either.”

“I was the designated driver.”

“And that’s all?”

It took me a while, but I finally caught on to what he was really asking.

Grabbing his arm, I stood on my toes to hiss in his ear, “Tell me you don’t think I’m knocked up like Alice.”

“Glad to hear it,” he said smoothly, planting a quick kiss on my cheek, disentangling himself from my grip, and moving away. “I really think you’re going to need that drink.”

“I don’t need a drink,” I muttered.

Then I turned around and realized I was wrong.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

E
VERYONE’S ALWAYS SAID
she’s an ethereal beauty. Maybe it’s her pale, delicate features, or maybe it’s because she seems to glow with an inner light. Or maybe it’s because when you look into her eyes, eyes that seem to shift from blue, to green, to gray, with every thought that passes through her mind, you can see how tenuous the grip the world has on her. And vice versa.

For a second I thought maybe I’d lost
my
grip on reality. It was bad enough I’d been talking to animals and going around killing people, but now I was seeing someone who shouldn’t be there. Who couldn’t be there.

I closed my eyes, willing the world, the real world, to come back into focus. I held my breath as I reopened them.

She was still there.

Closer now.

Close enough that I could reach out and touch her.

“Hello,” she said in that familiar lilting tone.

I couldn’t speak.

I couldn’t turn away.

I couldn’t run away.

And that’s what I wanted to do. I wanted to run away.

“Surprise!” Alice cheered from behind me.

I turned my head slowly.

Alice beamed at me. “You invited my mom, so I invited your mom. Isn’t it great that they’re both here?”

I swiveled my gaze back toward my mother. I’d invited her mom because she’d asked me to. I hadn’t asked her to invite my mom.

“Hello,” Mom said again. “You let your hair grow, Midge. It looks nice.”

Alice pushed past me, dragging Lamont behind her. “I’m so glad you were able to make it, Mrs. Lee. This is my fiancé, Lamont.”

“Husband,” my mother corrected gently with a tinkling laugh. “You’re going to have to get used to calling him that, Alice.”

They all laughed.

The sound seemed to dislodge me from my motionless stupor. I turned to run away and almost plowed into Armani.

“That is one
ugly
dress, Chiquita,” she said.

I could have said the same about her silver-sequined jumpsuit, but instead I demanded, “What the hell are you doing here?”

“I was invited.” She motioned toward Alice with the glass of champagne she held in her good hand. “She invited me at the bachelorette party.” Noticing the glass, she held it out to me. “Zeke said you need this.”

Snatching it from her, I guzzled it in three gulps.

Armani raised her eyebrows, but didn’t say anything about my drinking. “That’s your mama? Introduce me.”

“I can’t.” I hadn’t seen or talked to my mother in years. I wasn’t prepared to talk to her.

“Is it because of the stump?” Armani waved her disfigured hand in my face.

“Of course not!”

“Well then, why?”

Mom was looking past Alice and Lamont to me. If I didn’t get away soon . . .

“I don’t know her,” I told Armani.

“How can you not know her? She’s your mom.”

“But she’s lived in a nut— in an institution. I haven’t seen her for years.”

Armani looked at me like I was the one who belonged in a nuthouse. “But she’s your
mom
.”

My mom looked at me hopefully.

I’m not a bad person. I may be a contract killer, but I take a certain amount of pride in the effort I make to be a good person. I try to be polite to strangers, I don’t overindulge in office gossip, and I’m loyal to my friends and family. If I turned away from her, it would be as bad as Marlene running away from me. I couldn’t do it.

“C’mon.” I grabbed Armani’s shoulder and pushed her in front of me like she was a human shield.

“Mom, I’d like you to meet my friend Armani Vasquez. We work together. Armani, this is my mother, Mary Lee.”

“Nice to meet you.” Armani extended her good hand. “You have a beautiful aura. It sort of glitters.”

My mother looked a bit surprised by the aura comment, but she shook Armani’s hand. “It’s nice to meet you. It’s a lovely wedding, isn’t it?”

“I guess,” Armani said with a shrug. “If you’re into the whole public-display-of-affection thing.”

Mom’s laughter sounded like tinkling wind chimes. “I can see why you and Midge are friends. She hates weddings too.”

“Midge?” Armani asked.

“Middle Maggie,” Mom explained. “Theresa was the oldest. The twins were the youngest, so Middle Maggie became Midge.” Her smile faded away. “Now she’s the only one left.”

I held my breath, waiting for it, waiting for the disconnect that occurred when she got upset.

She blinked. “So you’re a friend of Alice’s too?”

“No. We just met at her bachelorette party. I’m really a friend of Maggie’s, that’s why I’m here, in case my girl needed some moral support or something.”

I was caught off guard by her revelation and more than a little touched.

“You have good friends, Midge.”

I nodded.

Armani snatched the empty champagne flute from my hand. “Good friends don’t let friends stay sober. Let me get you a refill.”

Mom and I watched her limp away.

“I’m not much of a drinker,” I said, not wanting my mother to think I was an alcoholic or something.

“Of course not. You were always the most serious of the girls. Do you mind if we sit down, these shoes are killing me.” She pointed to the sky-high stilettos on her feet.

“Loretta’s?” I asked as we sat down at a tiny round table.

“She was scandalized that I wanted to wear flats.”

I smiled at the irony that my aunt was more worried about footwear than the fact that her previously institutionalized sister was wandering around the cocktail hour without a visible chaperone.

“You looked sad standing up there, Midge.”

I looked away. “I’ve got a lot on my mind.”

“So I’ve heard. You’ve seen your father?”

Nodding, I looked back at her. A person would have to be deaf to miss the note of love and yearning in her voice when she talked about him. I’d never understood their crazy obsession with one another and I never would.

“He’s well?”

I doubted it, considering the phone call I’d gotten while at the hospital, but I didn’t want to tell her that. “He looked good when Alice and I went to see him to share the news of her engagement.”

Mom smiled forlornly. “I wish I could see him.”

“Have you seen Marlene, Mom?”

She blinked, surprised the question. “No one has.”

I nodded. If no one had seen her, what had she been doing at the hospital? Had she been visiting Katie or had it just been some bizarre twist of fate that had brought us face-to-face?

“I’m doing much better,” Mom blurted out.

“I can see that.”

“So if you wanted to come visit sometime I wouldn’t be . . . you know . . .” She twirled her finger by her ear, making the “crazy” sign.

I nodded, not wanting to make any promises I couldn’t keep. For all I knew I might have to use a temporary insanity defense if I got caught killing Garcia.

“I mean I know you’re busy with Katie, and your job, and your friends, but . . .” She trailed off sadly.

“I’m a pretty terrible daughter.”

“I was a pretty terrible mother.”

“No,” I protested. “You were sick.”

“It’s my fault that Darlene’s dead.” Her voice shook as she nervously wrung her hands. “If you’d been watching over them instead of me . . .” Tears glistened in her eyes.

I felt my own grow damp. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“It wasn’t
your
fault, Midge.”

“It wasn’t either of your faults.”

Mom and I both jumped as Aunt Susan inserted herself in the conversation. She put a hand on each of our shoulders. “It wasn’t anybody’s fault except the sick bastard that took her.”

“Language, Aunt Susan,” I teased weakly.

She smiled. “It’s high time both of you forgave yourselves and moved on. Your energy is better spent working toward the future than dwelling in the past.”

Out of the corner of my eye I spotted Zeke strolling over.

“Sorry to interrupt,” he said. “But Alice is asking for Maggie. It’s nice to see you, Mrs. Lee.”

I stood up to go with him and then turned back. Bending down, I hugged Mom. “I’m glad you came.” Straightening, I followed Zeke out of the room.

“You okay?” he asked as we climbed the stairs toward the bridal suite.

“I will be.”

And at least in that moment, I believed it.

The rest of the reception flowed smoothly. The bride and groom danced their first dance as man and wife; cutting the cake, they refrained from smashing it into one another’s faces; they tossed the bouquet and garter belt to a minimum of bloodshed.

Armani, of course, successfully fought off all the other single ladies for the bedraggled bouquet. The look on the face of the poor guy who caught the garter when she offered him her deformed leg to slide it up was priceless.

No one got too drunk, no disagreements broke out, and, except for the fact that not one, but two members of Lamont’s oversized-family broke chairs just by sitting on them, there was no drama at the party.

Everyone was having too good a time. I was getting nervous, as it got later and later. I had to get home to change into my waitress uniform and then get over to the Garcia wedding. I was all for celebrating and didn’t want to be the first to leave the nuptials of my best friend, but I had to go kill the guy who was responsible for my sister’s death.

In a strange twist of fate, it was my mother who came to the rescue.

She and Aunt Leslie were the first to go up to the happy couple and say their good-byes. Others soon followed suit. I joined the line.

Zeke stepped up behind me. “I thought we’d be stuck here all night.”

I ignored him. After all, he’d pretended I was invisible for the entire reception, dancing with every other single woman, and quite a few married ones, but not me. Apparently my silent treatment didn’t bother him. He didn’t say anything else to me as the line inched forward.

“Oh no!” Alice cried when she spotted us. “Are you guys going too?”

“It’s been a long weekend,” Zeke said smoothly, stepping past me to kiss her cheek. “I can’t speak for Maggie, but I’m beat.”

Hanging on Zeke’s arm, Alice asked me, “You’re not mad I invited your mom, are you?”

“I was. That was a hell of a thing to spring on me.”

Zeke gave me a warning look.

“But I’m not now,” I added hurriedly. The last thing I needed was another Alice-meltdown. I’d never get out of there. I had somewhere to be.

“She looks great and she recognized the necklace.” She touched the pendant.

“She does,” I agreed. “You’ve got other people who want to talk to you, so I’m going to go.”

“
We’re
going to go.” Zeke threw an arm around my shoulders, content to drift off of my momentum outta there.

“I’m so glad you two are getting along so well,” Alice gushed, kissing us both good-bye before turning her attention to her other guests.

I shook off his arm the second we were outside. He didn’t seem to care as he made a beeline to his car, without so much as a wave in my direction. I would have been hurt if I hadn’t been battling such pre-kill anxiety.

Rushing home, I told God and DeeDee about the events of the day as I changed into my disguise.

“I’m coming with you,” God declared.

“You can’t.”

“You’ve been threatened, you saw your sister, you talked to your mother. Quite frankly, your head is not in the game.”

The lizard was right.

“You need my help.”

He was right about that too.

“I’m not carrying a purse. There’s no way to carry you, and if I walk into a wedding with a lizard perched on my shoulder, I’m going to attract attention, and that’s the last thing I need.”

He stroked his chin thoughtfully. “You haven’t lost all of your faculties.”

“You couldn’t just say I’m right?”

“I’ll walk in when you do. No one will notice me. I can run ahead and do reconnaissance.”

“You could get trampled to death.”

“And you could get caught. Those are the risks we’re going to have to take if we’re going to keep Katie.”

“What if I lose you in the crowd?”

“We’ll rendezvous at the car.”

“You’ve been watching spy movies, haven’t you?”

“And military action flicks . . . I want to be all I can be.”

I resisted telling him he was all of a few inches long. “It sounds like a plan.”

Like plans ever work . . .