“And I couldn’t date her. She knew too much about me. Wouldn’t be no fun in that.” Victor laughed. “Thanks for the tea, but we got to get going. Got to get my lawn mowed this afternoon. Y’all want me to ride my mower up here and take care of yours?”
“How much do you charge?” Amanda asked.
“Well now, I reckon if you’d make up another pitcher of tea and maybe if you brought out some homemade cookies that would be plenty of payment.” He grinned.
“You make the tea, I’ll bring the cookies, and we’ll have a front porch visit,” Hattie said. “Say about three o’clock?”
“Sounds great to me, but do you have to ride yours up?” Jamie asked. “Maybe there’s a mower here.”
“There’s not,” Victor said. “Conrad had it done by someone out of Seymour, but now that things have changed, I’ll be glad to take care of it for you this summer.”
“He’s got a new riding mower. One of them zero-turn things and the new ain’t wore off yet,” Hattie teased. “You know what the difference between men and boys is?”
Kate thought they were the same, especially the ones she’d met.
“What?” Amanda asked.
“The price of their toys.” Hattie giggled.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Kate almost didn’t answer the phone, hearing a ringtone she’d rather avoid. But on the fifth ring, she relented. “Hello, Mother.”
“I hate to do this to you as you are trying to get all this crap sorted out, but there’s one small project that you were working on that we can’t finish without a couple of hours of work from you. If I e-mail it, can you—”
“Yes,” Kate butted in, “I’ll take care of it.” She paused a moment. “I probably should tell you that both of his other wives showed up here the same day I did.”
“That’s horrible. Why haven’t you left?” Teresa’s voice went all high and squeaky, but by golly, not a single I told you so came out of her mouth.
“Conrad brought all three of us here for our honeymoons, and we’re trying to find some closure,” Kate answered.
“That pregnant redheaded one is liable to kill you in your sleep. You can see it in her eyes. Even after all the theatrics, my money would be on her as a suspect in the murder. She might not have done it and she might be sorry about it, but I bet she knows something. Now I’ll worry about you,” Teresa said.
Kate held the phone out from her cheek and stared at it. Where was her mother and who had taken over her body? Kate’s father had worried about her, but Teresa? Never. She barely had time to acknowledge that she even had a daughter. A savvy business partner, yes, for sure. But a daughter that she worried about?
“Are you there? Did we lose the connection?” Teresa yelled.
Kate put the phone back to her ear. “I’m fine,” Kate said. “And I would love to work from home on whatever you need done. Just send it to me and I’ll get right on it.”
Teresa chuckled. “We’re workaholics. I’ll tell Joyce to send it over to you, and maybe it will keep you from killing off the other wives for one day. But if you get really bored, I could send work every day.”
“It might keep them from killing me if I get bitchy from boredom. I’m not sure I want a daily regimen, but if I change my mind, I will let you know.” Kate laughed.
“I haven’t heard your voice that cheerful in years,” Teresa said.
“Crazy, isn’t it?” Kate said. “I’m in a situation that borders on bizarre and I’m actually kind of content. Tell Joyce hello for me, and I’ll have the work done by quittin’ time today.”
“It’s on the way. Keep me up-to-date on this soap opera. I never had time to watch those things, but then my daughter wasn’t starring in one.”
“Will do, and thanks,” Kate said.
Kate picked up her laptop and carried it to the front porch, propped her feet up on the railing, and settled down to work. It wouldn’t be difficult to work from home in conditions like this. Plenty of sunshine, sweet tea beside her, barefoot, no constricting clothing, and her blonde hair in a ponytail—a really nice change from her usual office attire and four walls.
A gentle south breeze brought Gracie’s squeals from the dock to the porch, and Kate heard the occasional splash and remembered enjoying the pool in their backyard when she was Gracie’s age. Her father would sit in a chair grading papers, and she’d squeal and splash all she wanted. Sometimes her mother would join her in the pool, but when she did, it was all business and exercise. Teresa would swim to one end, kick off, and repeat the process until she got her desired number of laps for the day. Then she would get out, wrap up in a white terry robe, and kiss Kate’s dad on the top of the head on her way inside to get dressed for dinner.
“I hadn’t thought of that in years,” Kate said as she opened the folder Joyce had sent, and in seconds she was engrossed in finishing a project she’d started a month before.
Amanda sat on the deck all afternoon with a romance book in her hands. Her back hurt from two nights on the sofa. Aunt Ellie had found mice had eaten into the one in the garage, so she’d had to go out and buy a new full-size bed for Amanda. Tonight her aunt and her new bed would be there.
More than reading, she’d spent time watching Gracie and Jamie down on the dock. Oh, how she wished that there was no such thing as ultrasound equipment that could tell parents the sex of their child. She would have loved to at least hope for a little girl like Gracie. The little girl was such a bundle of joy and happiness all rolled into one that just watching her run up and down the shoreline was delightful.
She expected any moment to wake up and find that this whole past week had been nothing but a horrible nightmare. Everything was so overwhelming that she wanted to crawl into a closet and not come out for at least a year. By then maybe she could digest all that information Kate had told them while they’d made lunch together.
After finishing off a bottle of water, she eased up off the chaise lounge and went inside to the bathroom. On the way back outside, she picked up two more bottles. How twenty ounces of nothing but water could make her have to go to the bathroom at least three times was a mystery.
She stretched back out on the lounge, pulled a big floppy straw hat down over her eyes, and wished that all love stories could have a happy-ever-after like she read in romances. In a few seconds, she was sound asleep, and she didn’t wake until she heard her aunt’s voice right beside her.
“Hey, girl, are you going to sleep all day and night, too? Or are you going to come on inside and have that sub sandwich you ordered?” Aunt Ellie asked.
“No and yes.” Amanda stretched. Then reality reminded her that her life was nothing like the romance novels, and she sighed. Life would never be the same.
Aunt Ellie, God love her heart and soul, had been Amanda’s savior most of her life, and though she was past fifty, her aunt was still taking care of her. She looked plumb worn out that evening, but then she’d worked all day and then driven an hour to bring the bed to Bootleg.