Was she too late? Had Carla taken the kids and run?
Max jerked the car door open and stepped into the road without looking. A car whooshed by, her hair rustling in its wake. Idiot. Too damn fast for neighborhood streets. Her heart rate didn’t return to normal quickly. Speeding cars made her nervous now.
The lingering tension was just as well. She needed her adrenaline high to enter this particular confrontation.
Max had to knock twice, the second time louder than the first. She’d almost given up when the door whisked open. The house smelled of last night’s tacos, cat pee, and cigarettes. The TV blared with the sound of cartoon voices accompanied by childish laughter.
The woman wore a short-sleeved, faded cotton robe pulled tightly around her bulk. It might once have been white with perky pink and blue flowers. The lines around her eyes appeared much older than the freshly applied blue-black tint in her hair. A drop of the black dye had oozed down her forehead and stained her pale skin. A hint of gray would have softened her, but Max didn’t think Carla Drake’s mother had ever been soft. The flesh of her face had the texture of leather. She’d smoked too many years to stop now. In a few more, she’d probably find out she had cancer and sue the tobacco companies before she died. It would be a messy suit and a messy death. In the end, she’d virtually suffocate to death because her lungs no longer worked, and the lawyers would get all the money.
Max shuddered and wondered how true the vivid image would be.
“Is Carla home, Mrs. Abrams?” Max didn’t know if Mr. Abrams was home. She wondered if he was the cause of the bitterness marring the woman’s face. She wondered, too, if Yvonne Abrams was the reason the yard was so neat, the man of the house worked it to avoid his wife.
“Who’s askin’ for her?”
“My name’s Max Starr. I work at Hackett’s Appliance Parts, and I needed to talk to her about her COBRA insurance.”
“That lousy husband of hers can pay the goddamn bill.” Voice deep, rough, and edged with anger, Mrs. Abrams didn’t know the meaning of happiness. Nor had she bred a happy daughter.
“I’m here to help. Remy Hackett—”
“That asswipe. We ain’t got a pot to piss in around here, and he’s threatening to cut off her insurance.”
“He can’t do that, Mrs. Abrams. It’s against the law. Please, I need to speak with—”
“Fuck ‘im. And get your bony ass off my front porch.”
“Gramma,” a puny voice called. Max could gauge neither the age nor the sex.
“Shut the fuck up, Jorey, Gramma’s busy.” She didn’t even turn her head to throw out the command, as if the words came naturally, a normal fragment of speech, an accepted element of Nick’s children’s lives.
Such was the house Carla Abrams Drake had grown up in. Max could almost feel sorry for her.
In the living room, the child hushed.
Max tried another tack. “Your daughter’s in big trouble, Mrs. Abrams.”
“If she is, she did it to herself. Dumping her brats here, then taking off until all hours of the morning. She deserves the frigging electric chair.”
Max’s heart stopped. For a moment, she thought she’d suffered cardiac arrest. Until her blood drummed in her ears. She cocked her head to one side, then the other. “You know, don’t you?”
“Know what?” Yvonne Abrams didn’t wait for an answer. “I told you to get off my porch.” She made a move to cut Max off, her yellowed fingers reaching for the bright green door.
“Carla brought the kids here the night she picked them up at the airport. But she didn’t stay, did she?”
Yvonne was stone silent. Her throat worked to erase the mistake her mouth had made. “Course she did.”
“The police can arrest you for perjury, Mrs. Abrams.” Max was rewarded with a tightening of the woman’s mouth, a spark of fear in her eyes. “The detective’s been here, hasn’t he?”
“They can’t do a thing unless I testify.”
“So you did lie.”
“I didn’t say that. I watch enough Law and Order to know you have to testify to commit perjury.”
“TV shows are known to bend the law to fit their needs.”
For a moment, Max thought she had her, but Yvonne’s claw-like fingers gripped the door, and her gaze sharpened. “I thought you came here to help Carla with that Hackett asshole?”
“I came to talk to Carla. Do you know her husband’s been arrested for murder?”
“The bum deserves whatever he gets.” Max was certain Nick’s confession came as no surprise to Yvonne. It was probably the reason Carla had left the house before nine a.m. Hiding out or celebrating, Max couldn’t be sure.
Max felt the slam of the door looming just ahead of her. But she wouldn’t go without a parting shot to shake the woman up. “You know your daughter could have done it just as easily as her husband.”
She saw the goose bumps rise on Yvonne Abrams bare arms.