Sunset Bridge (11 page)

Even with the recession in full swing, this house still had to be worth a fortune. Maggie and Felo had bought their house together, fixed it up side-by-side, but with plummeting real estate prices, she was afraid the simple bungalow in Little Havana was worth, at most, what remained on their mortgage. When the time came to make a final financial break, she could just walk away and let him have it without a fuss. At least there was one positive coming out of the tense financial climate.

“Are you doing okay?” Blake asked after two hours, when he found her settled into a deck chair with a glass goblet filled with chocolate mousse. The deck was lit with tiki torches and soft lamps, and Maggie had been glad to find a seat in the shadows.

“Most likely not. Between working in a pie shop and your mousse, I’m going to have to work out every night for the rest of my life.”

He lowered himself to a stool beside her and grinned engagingly. “I have a feeling you’re not a party girl. More the quiet type.”

She hadn’t told him much about herself. She didn’t publicize the fact that she’d been a cop. People got odd notions when they heard, as if they thought she was hoping to catch them doing something felonious. Instead, she’d mentioned a variety of jobs along the way, including education and PR. Both were true. She’d helped with the DARE program in the schools to educate children not to use drugs, and she had been the community liaison in her years in the sheriff’s department.
Important jobs, sure, but in that department, the only qualification an officer had needed to get them was breasts.

She told Blake a little more. “I guess I’m more or less the quiet type, but I’m not uncomfortable. I like to watch people, and I like to talk to them once I know them.”

“What do you see here?”

She smiled. “Why?”

“Just curious. How does this group seem to you?”

She considered, because the question was interesting. “High octane,” she said at last. “Upwardly mobile. Polite, but busy making contacts, so they move on fast. Your partners are working the crowd because they’re newest to the community and still taking the local temperature. The city and county folks are trying to figure out how friendly is too friendly. They’re investing a lot in Cardrake, so they’re watching you carefully.”

“We’re not all work and no play. We have a couple of boats, and we fish. My group here just took a trip to Vegas together. Male bonding.”

She had noticed there weren’t any women on the team working on the bridge, an interesting omission. She wondered if the same good ol’ boy network she’d fought so hard against in the sheriff’s department also operated at Cardrake, and if it was as potentially lethal to women.

“Is it the gambling in Vegas that attracts you guys?” she asked.

“It’s the supercharged atmosphere and people watching, but I do enjoy losing my life savings now and then. Keeps me humble.”

“Bet you were texting your contacts half the time, just to see what was going on.”

“Your PR roots are showing. Are you going to pursue a job here?”

“Right now I’m committed to helping my mother make a go of the pie shop. She’s had an array of incompetent assistants and needs a breather.”

“So do you.”

She cocked her head in question. “I do?”

“I’m guessing a breakup? Or maybe a job that got so bad you left, wounded and angry.”

She was surprised he had hit those particular nails on the head and driven them home. “A little of both,” she admitted.

“Dumb guy, whoever he is.”

“Not dumb, no. I was the one who left, so maybe I’m the dumb one.” The moment she said it, she wished she hadn’t.

“Do you feel dumb?”

“No. Wounded and angry are more along the right lines.”

“Too early to be going out with somebody else?”

She smiled. She liked Blake. He was easygoing, at least on the surface, and a better listener than most of the men she’d dated before Felo. He was the perfect guy to go out with after a breakup. Undemanding—at least so far—and successful enough that she wasn’t going to have to hold his hand and encourage him while she was finding her own way.

“You’ll have to tell
me,
” she said. “I’m not in the market for anything except casual right now. If you’re looking for more, you need to look elsewhere. If you’re not, spending time together works for me.”

“This is going to be an intensive, difficult time workwise. I don’t want complications. Maybe we’re ideally suited.”

If they really were ideally suited, she knew she should feel something other than the vague interest stirring inside her, but she nodded. “Don’t you need to get back to schmoozing?”

“People are starting to leave. My partners are going to head down to a club in Naples for a little more celebration. Want to come along?”

That was easy. She shook her head. “I promised I’d check out the adult swim team at the rec center in the morning. I told Tracy I used to swim competitively in college, and it was all downhill from there. I’d better make this an early night.”

“You’re a swimmer? Go on. I was on my high school swim team. Maybe we can train together sometime.”

She tried to imagine Felo in a Speedo and goggles, and couldn’t. “I’ll let you know how it goes,” she promised.

“Let me say goodbye to a couple more people, then I’ll drive you home.”

By the time she was in Blake’s car heading back across the key, she was looking forward to slipping into casual clothes and flipping through the television channels. These days her attention span was, at most, three minutes long, which worked perfectly for most shows.

“Looks like you have a visitor,” Blake said as they pulled up to Maggie’s cottage.

She had already noted the same. This time Felo’s car was parked directly in front of her house, and the man himself was sitting on her porch, Rumba curled in his lap. The front door had been locked, but Felo was masterful with a credit card.

“An old friend,” she said as Blake pulled to a stop behind Felo’s car.

“
The
old friend?”

“’Fraid so.”

“Want me to scare him away?”

She laughed. “He’d have you in handcuffs. He’s a cop.”

“A cop?” He sounded surprised.

“A good one, too, but impatient. I’d suggest dropping me off and turning toward Naples.”

He didn’t rev the engine. “I’m not leaving if there’s going to be trouble here.”

She was surprised, and a bit touched. After all, Blake really didn’t know any of the important things about her.

She rested her fingertips on his arm to reassure him. “I promise there won’t be. He’s not a psycho in uniform. Felo would never lift a hand to any woman unless she had a gun in hers.”

“If you’re sure…”

“Absolutely.” She leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Thanks for inviting me tonight. I had fun.”

“No, you didn’t.”

“Actually, I did. Great food, interesting people. Let’s do it again.”

He touched his fingers to his forehead in salute.

She got out and watched him drive away before she started toward her front porch.

“You broke into my house,” she said in greeting.

“Don’t you know any locks that take at least a minute to open?” He stood, Rumba in his arms. His black guayabera shirt was unbuttoned halfway down his chest, and despite a slight chill in the air, he wore shorts. “She heard me and started scratching at the door. I didn’t want you to lose your damage deposit.”

“I didn’t pay a damage deposit. Did you search the house just to see what I’m up to?”

“I opened the door six inches and hauled Rumba out to the steps. If I’d searched, what would I have found?”

“Remnants of a couple of pies in the fridge. A brand-new
TV Guide
.”

“And to think I just sat here.”

They were face-to-face now. She couldn’t summon outrage. Felo knew she hadn’t left him for another man. There was nothing to search for, no evidence to collect. She doubted he was lying.

“Who’s the guy?” he asked.

“Not your business.”

He nodded. “Tell me anyway.”

She debated, but what was there to hide? “His name is Blake Armstrong. He’s an engineer, and his firm is building a new bridge to Palmetto Grove.”

“Glad to hear it. The present one creaked when I drove across. And swayed.”

“No, it didn’t.”

He shrugged. “Well, if they say they have to replace it now, they probably should have done it ten years ago. That’s how things work.”

“Are you stalking me?”

He stroked the cat thoughtfully. “Nothing that formal.”

“Felo, what are you doing here?”

“I brought your things. Everything I could carry, anyway.”

For a moment she forgot to breathe. He had moved her out. Just like that. She’d been steeling herself to do it, waiting for the right moment. But how long before that moment would have arrived?

“That’s a lot of trouble,” she said, not betraying her turmoil.

“Yeah, but I’ve got a few days off. I’m going to Alvaro’s camp on the way home. So this wasn’t that far out of the way.”

His old friend owned a hunting camp off the Loop Road in
the Big Cypress Swamp, about halfway between Miami and Palmetto Grove. Maggie had avoided it the way she avoided anything to do with Alvaro Hernandez, although it was the kind of place she would probably enjoy. Simple, almost primitive, surrounded by unadulterated nature and quiet. Felo often went there when he needed to be alone, or just to be outdoors without any motivation other than to enjoy sun and fresh air.

“There’s some furniture I’d like to have,” she said, gaze flicking to the car.

“Relax, I just got what was obvious. Things you might need here. There’s still a bunch of stuff at the house. And anything you want is yours. Only…”

“Only what?”

“Don’t be in such a hurry, Mags.” He reached up and cupped her cheek. When she didn’t pull away, he stroked it a moment. “I love you,” he said softly. “That’s not going away any time soon. But maybe this is good, huh? You being here, me being there. Maybe we need time to figure out what went wrong. Maybe you can figure out how to tell me what you need. And I’ll figure out how to tell you the same.”

“Telling me what
you
need’s never been the problem. Telling me what to
do
was never your problem, either.”

Something flickered in his eyes, but he waited a beat before he responded. “Then I’ll learn to ask.”

“Felo…” She shook her head.

“You want me to leave and never come back? You can say that right here and now? ‘Felo, go home and stay out of my life’? Because if I’m going to listen to you, I guess I need to hear you say it right out loud.”

She waited for the words to form, but she knew the sun would rise again before she found them.
If
she found them.

“You can’t say it, can you?”

She remained still and quiet.

“Want to help me unpack the car?” he asked.

“Let me put Rumba in the second bedroom.” She opened the door and took the cat inside. When she returned, Felo was lifting a box from the car. She moved aside as he carried it up the walk. Between them, the car was unloaded in five minutes.

“I’ll head out now,” he said, straightening up after the last box was sitting on her living room floor. “There’s just one more thing. I almost forgot.”

She’d expected another stab at intimacy, something else to tie them together, but instead he left for the car and returned with a small cooler she’d noticed on the front seat. She had assumed it was food he was taking to Alvaro’s camp, but Felo held it out to her and lifted the top. Fabulous smells emerged. “Some men give diamonds and some give BMWs. Me, I give
maduros, moros y cristianos, lechon asado.”

Plantain, beans and rice, and spiced, marinated roast pork. “You brought this from Corrado’s?”

“Maybe you left
me
for a while, but I figured you’d be mourning Corrado.”

“Felo…” Again, she didn’t know what to say. Corrado’s was a hole in the wall near their house, but the food was a closely guarded neighborhood secret. Corrado, the owner, had more business than he could handle already, and Maggie adored everything about the peeling linoleum tables, and the dollar bills and business cards tacked on the wall behind the bar. She took the cooler and dipped her head lower to inhale. “Corrado can cook almost as well as you can.”

“You take your time, but when you’re ready, I’ll cook for you again.”

She finally looked up. “I can’t tell you when or if I’ll be ready, Felo. Maybe I’ve finally had enough of men telling me what to do. Maybe I just need a permanent vacation from relationships. Don’t count on anything.”

“You know what I count on? You love me, too, Mags. Somehow we lost our way. I’m still not sure how. But we’ll find each other again.” He leaned over and kissed her. Not as casually as she had kissed Blake in the car, but carefully, as if he knew he could push her a millimeter too far, too fast, and lose her forever.

“When you’re ready.” He left her standing there, Rumba yowling from the spare bedroom, the smells of garlic and cumin scenting the air, and Maggie wondering exactly how she and Felo had come to this.

W
anda was getting over her fluster. So she’d reacted a little to having her pies on a restaurant menu, then to having them declared good enough for the likes of Derek Forbes. Who wouldn’t have? After all, she was human. Life was full of good things, only most of the time they flew right past a person’s nose before she had the common sense to pluck the feathers out of her nostrils.

This good fortune had just landed, perched and flapped its wings, waiting for her to do something before it dropped a load she sure didn’t want in her lap. And she
had
done something. She, Wanda Gray, could now be struck dead without a moment of regret. She had married a good man, raised two passable children and fulfilled her final purpose on earth. She had baked pies good enough for a movie star and a restaurant opening.

In the kitchen of Wanda’s Wonderful Pies, she splayed one hand across her ample chest and realized, to her satisfaction,
that her heart was still pounding away, and she might live to see even more fame and fortune. The thought was delicious.

“You all right?” Maggie asked, escaping to the back for a moment to replenish the pie case, which had just been the victim of a raid, thanks to a ladies luncheon at the local Pentecostal church and apparently no lady alive who had time to bake her own contribution.

Wanda dropped her hand to her side. “How many’d you sell?”

“Five. I wonder if there’ll be anything on that buffet table besides pie?”

“Winn-Dixie’s rotisserie chicken. And most likely Publix macaroni and potato salads right out of the plastic containers.”

“I never realized how lucky I was to have a mother who made our meals from scratch.”

“Maybe that’s why you went for Felo. The man can cook.”

“He brought me food from our favorite restaurant on Saturday.”

Wanda looked up. This was Maggie
sharing,
unusual enough to make her wonder if she’d heard her daughter right. “Felo was here
again?
”

“He brought a carload of my belongings over. He’s spending some time at Alvaro’s camp.”

“Moved you out?”

“More like
helped
me out.” Maggie seemed to shake off the sudden intimacy. “Anyway, want me to replace the pies I sold with the same ones?” She poked her head in the refrigerator, then back out. “We’re already out of Key lime. Shall we make more?”

The hardest thing about running a pie shop was knowing
each day what would sell and what wouldn’t. A pie unsold was money down the disposal. Some pies held for more than one day, but many did not. And most of what she made couldn’t be frozen without compromising the quality. The local homeless shelter got a lot of Wanda’s miscalculations. The men had taken to making requests.

“Let’s push Luscious Lemon instead.”

“Fine with me, only there’s just one back here and one out front.”

Wanda thought about all the things she really ought to do, but nodded. “I’ll make a couple more Key lime. If they don’t sell, they’re a favorite over at the rescue mission.”

“They call you Queen Wanda, you know. When I told them I was your daughter, they started calling me Princess Margaret.”

“They’re all short on money, but a sense of humor’s free.”

The front doorbell tinkled, and Maggie, a pie in each hand, went to answer, while Wanda stooped to gather the ingredients she was going to need.

In a moment Maggie came back. “There’s a guy out front who says he has to speak to you.”

“Who?”

“Tracy’s guy.”

Wanda snapped to attention. “Maybe Wild Florida needs a pie party. I’d better check this out.” But even as she said it, she knew Marsh Egan was far too important to come tripping over to her shop to pick out pies. She was wary, and sorry the place was so small there was no way she could pretend she wasn’t here.

“Want me to start juicing the limes?”

“You do that,” Wanda said.

She marched out front, brushing off her apron as she went.
There was a couple in one corner finishing slices of the apple pie she reluctantly included on her menu now and then. Her apple pie was good, no doubt about it, but the pie was so darned ordinary, even with her secret splash of whiskey. Another man was talking quietly on his cell phone by the door. He was waiting for people to join him, and he’d already picked out a slice of German walnut all his own and made her promise she wouldn’t sell it to anybody else. Looked to her as if he was getting impatient.

Marsh was standing by the front counter in a suit and tie, which never looked quite right on him. Wanda liked Tracy’s boyfriend. Marsh had been good for her landlady, straightened her out about a thing or two, and showed her she was a different person from the one she’d believed herself to be.

Of course, his politics were scandalous. Wanda liked the environment well enough in its place, but she wasn’t sure Wild Florida ought to be halting development on every country road and patch of swamp. Still, she was glad he’d convinced Tracy not to let anybody turn Happiness Key into condos for millionaires. The houses she and the others lived in were no better than beach huts, but the land? The land was something special, and Wanda could see that, politics or no.

“Why don’t I buy you a cup of coffee,” Marsh said.

“We got coffee here.”

“You’ve also got customers. I need to talk to you.”

She debated. Of course, if she was the boss, she could take off whenever she wanted, right? Nobody was clocking her comings and goings.

“My coffee’s better,” she said. “We’ll take cups and go over to the park.”

“Black, thanks.”

She told Maggie she was going out; then she poured coffee
into disposable cups that said Wanda’s Wonderful Pies above a pie slice logo Janya had designed, slipped a sleeve around and a lid over, then joined him.

The park was a block away. They chatted about nothing important as they strolled, then found a bench overlooking an empty ball field that would be in constant use after school let out for the day. The moment their behinds hit the bench, the chitchat ended.

“Tracy’s pregnant, isn’t she?” Marsh asked, the way he might ask if Wanda had sold more pecan or sweet-potato pies that month.

She’d been in the middle of a sip, and now coffee sprayed everywhere.

Marsh patted her on the back and waited patiently.

Wanda and all the rest of the women had been sworn to secrecy, but clearly, the secret was out. Faced with the truth, she couldn’t imagine pretending otherwise, because this was one secret that was going to be pretty obvious in no time.

“It’s none of my business,” she said instead.

“True, but it’s mine, isn’t it? Don’t I deserve to know?”

“Then why don’t you ask her?”

Marsh was silent a moment. “Here’s why,” he said, as if he was explaining the law to a developer caught in the act of dredging up sea-grass beds. “She doesn’t want me to know, or she would have told me by now. So before I confront her, it’s up to me to find out
why
. And who better to explain?”

“If you’re worried it’s not yours, don’t be. No question about that. She and that rat CJ never slept together after their divorce. Never even got close.”

“Thank you, but that wasn’t on my list.”

“Good for you. I like a man who trusts a woman.”

“So she
is
pregnant.”

Wanda realized she’d as much as told him so. “I don’t feel comfortable talking about this.”

“Some things are out of our comfort zone, Wanda, but that doesn’t make them wrong. I could shake the truth out of her. We could have a huge fight. I could say all the wrong things because I don’t know what’s going on, and in the long run, would that be good for Tracy or the baby?”

“I see why you’re good at what you do.”

Marsh sipped his coffee and gave her time to consider.

“How’d you figure it out?” she asked.

“I had my suspicions, then Saturday night she had me to dinner. Never has anyone cooked a meal more perfectly suited for a woman in her first trimester. But the clincher…?”

He’d been staring straight ahead, but now he glanced at her. “She pretended she was drinking white wine, then she made an emergency trip to the bathroom. So I took a sip, just to find out. Water, with lemon juice in it. It was clear what that was all about, what this mysterious stomach virus was about, what the whole damn thing is about. I waited all night for her to break the news, even went through with birth control, but no go.”

“She’s planning to tell you, you know.”

“When? When the kid needs college tuition?”

Wanda pointed a finger at him. “It’s your own fault.”

“Yeah, I know when it must have happened, and it
was
my fault. Hers, too, but neither of us was thinking straight that night.”

Wanda covered her ears. She didn’t mind talking about sex, that was for sure, but not sex between good friends. “Too much information. Lordy.”

He smiled just a little. “Wanda, you must know how this goes. You have kids, too.”

“Why’d you come to me?”

“You can’t keep a secret.”

She just shook her head sadly, because it was true.

“Why isn’t she telling me?” he asked. “Is she trying to figure out what to do?”

She debated, but she decided not knowing could be the source of some harmful guesses. Like that one. It was better to put them to rest. “She’s having the baby, if that’s what you mean. Never in doubt.” She paused.

“Here’s the thing.” She started slow, but that didn’t last. “Tracy and you, you’ve got some kind of weird history, don’t you? Don’t deny it. Enemies, then friends, then you hardly spoke while your exes were both in town this summer making trouble. Then suddenly, bingo, you fall into bed together and this happens. You were just starting to get to know each other, be a couple, and now, whammo, she’s got a little peach pie in the oven. And how’s she supposed to know how that’s going to affect your relationship? I mean, one minute you’re jumping down each other’s throats, the next you’re jumping into bed together and now you’re jumping into diapers and training wheels.”

“Tracy knows how I feel about my son. Why would she doubt I’d love another child?”

Wanda wondered how dumb a smart man could be. “You think I’m saying
that’s
what she’s worried about? Whether you could love another child? How about whether you love
her?
Knock me naked! Have you ever told her? Have you even thought about your own feelings?”

“That’s the problem?” He sounded as if it was way too minor to be real.

“This is no small thing, Marshall Egan! Any woman with a brain wants to be connected to a man and sure where she
stands before she has his baby. And you know what? Nobody ever loved Tracy Deloche enough, you ask me. Not her parents, and surely not that no-good ex of hers. She’s just started realizing she’s lovable, really lovable, on account of all her neighbors, and now this. She’s got a baby on the way and a man who’s never said the words she needs to hear.”

“I don’t know what else I could have done to prove I care about her.”

“Oh, really? You think demanding she go off and do the stuff that appeals to you over and over again and not do anything
she
loves is a good way of showing how much you care?”

“Wow, I’ve been missing out on some fascinating conversations, haven’t I?”

She refused to let him off the hook. “She doesn’t complain, if that’s what you’re getting at. But from what I can read between the lines, it’s all about you and none about her. Like you’re trying to make her prove she could be the right woman for the head honcho of Wild Florida. Like camping in the Everglades is some sort of initiation ritual.”

“That’s not true.”

“When’s the last time you took her somewhere
she
wanted to go? A nice restaurant? A play? Maybe some fancy hotel for a weekend?”

Marsh was silent.

“You think about it,” Wanda said.

“And that’s why she hasn’t told me? Because we didn’t cuddle up in a suite at the Ritz last month?”

“This isn’t a courtroom, and I’m not your enemy.”

Marsh sighed. “Help me understand, okay?”

“It’s real simple. She wants to be sure you’re together,
if
you’re together, because you want to be with
her
. Then this
baby will be a bonus. But if you’re together because the baby forced you into it? Nothing like a bonus. A wedge. You have a son. You know those early years aren’t the best for romance. You let a baby come between you, and it sure as shootin’ will. You got to be strong, and you got to be together and you got to be
sure
.”

“And she’s not sure.”

“Are you?”

He didn’t answer, but of course Wanda knew she wasn’t the one he needed to tell.

“So what do I do?” he asked when she glanced at her watch.

“You figure it out. I told you what she needs, what she’s trying to find out. Now you figure out a way to give it to her. Or not. I can’t make you. It’s all up to you. But just a word of advice?”

She waited until he nodded. “Take a good look at Tracy sometime, okay? You ever walk down the street with her? You ever watch heads turn? Male heads? She’s hanging out with you for a reason, and it’s not because she can’t find somebody else. You understand what I’m saying here?”

“Yeah. If she were a fish, I’d be stupid not to make sure the hook’s in good and tight.”

“Your metaphors need work, son. Too Wild Florida for me.” Wanda got to her feet. “I’ll walk myself back. You stay here and think. But you tell anybody we had this conversation and I’m going to create me a new pie in your honor—the Ground-Glass Special. You get my meaning?”

“You talk tough.”

“Try me.”

“I can’t believe I’m asking you for advice about my love life.”

“Believe it,” she said. “And take it seriously. This is a woman you don’t want to lose.”

Alice had agreed to teach the class on crocheted snowflakes, and on Tuesday at four she came to the center with Olivia to fill out paperwork and see the classroom Tracy had assigned her. Cozy, comfortably furnished with armchairs and a large coffee table, all the needlework classes met there, and the rec center quilters had their weekly bee in the room. Unless dozens of people signed up to crochet, Tracy thought it was perfect.