Part 9 (1/2)

”Basically.”

”You are contrary.”

”Yep,” he said, grinning. He pointed to my head. ”You have something different going on up here.”

I retorted, ”You don't know the half of it.”

”No, your hair.”

I ran a hand through it. ”Yeah, my brother got me drunk and cut it. It's sort of a thing with him.”

Monroe pursed his lips. ”Interesting. Did that girl with all the cranial accessories catch up to you?”

”You saw Maya?”

”She was hard to miss,” he said, gesturing to where Maya's piercings were. ”She came to my place first and I told her where to find you.”

”Okay, new rule-when strangers with face piercings come looking for me, don't tell them where I live,” I said as I accepted the beer. I laughed, took a sip, and winced. ”You know, there's a reason I only drink booze with fruit in the t.i.tle. I'm not good at the casual beer drinking.”

”Would it help if I chanted chug chug chug?”

”So you're trying to peer pressure me? Haven't you heard? Emotionally vulnerable divorcees are easy pickins, we don't need drunkenness as an excuse. We throw ourselves at every available man to prove we're still s.e.xually relevant.”

He took a moment, I prefer to think, to make the blood go back to the appropriate places. ”Okay, I deserved that one.”

”And, please, the moon glittering on the water, gentle waves lapping against the sh.o.r.e, cold beer, clever innuendos. This is a terrible seduction scenario.” I paused to take another drink and then added, ”Amateur.”

He sighed. ”I'd really like to sidestep all the weird tension stuff and just be two people who happen to live near each other. You seem like a nice person and it takes up too much energy to try to ignore you. You're un-ignorable.”

”Fine. I agree I will not break into your house and bake for you without permission,” I swore, holding up my hand. ”If you will promise not to make suicidal gesture your first guess if you see me do something weird. Maybe suicidal gesture could be your second or third guess.”

He reached out and shook my hand. ”Agreed.”

15 * You Don't Choose a Nickname, a Nickname Chooses You.

It turned out that Monroe was a very pleasant neighbor when he wasn't convinced I was out to seduce him against his will.

We still kept our distance. Monroe generally stayed inside, working at his computer, unless there was some pressing reason for him to come out. I was careful not to be the reason he had to come out. But now, instead of glaring at each other from across the yard, we smiled and waved. Monroe wasn't pressured into socializing, which made him happy. And I was getting fewer dirty looks, which made me happy.

And apparently there were heretofore unknown advantages to Mike being so a.n.a.l-retentive about money. It had taken him and his lawyer very little time to turn over his financial statements.

Samantha called to say she would be ”coming by” to discuss Mike's financial disclosures. She made it sound like it wasn't a big deal to drive fifty miles of back roads to visit a client, but I was paying for her time... and mileage. Hmm. I think she wanted to check out my living arrangements and make sure I wasn't writing ”Die, Mike, Die” on the walls.

It felt sort of weird to see her in my natural habitat, because my natural habitat involved me wearing sweatpants, but no makeup, at 3:00 p.m. I was sitting on the porch, reading over my ”how my marriage died” statement, when I heard her car pull up.

My big bad divorce attorney had her hair drawn up into a ponytail, her jacket slung over her arm, and was hefting an oversized picnic hamper along with her briefcase. Her sleeveless silk blouse was rumpled and wrinkled. She looked about twelve years old. Her voice was stretched very thin as she said, ”Hi.”

”Long day?” I asked, offering her a gla.s.s of iced tea, which she downed in a few gulps.

She flopped into the wicker chair across from me. ”Do you know what it's like to spend six hours with two grown adults fighting over custody of Star Wars action figures?”

I shook my head, pouring her another gla.s.s. ”No, I honestly do not.”

”Well, count your blessings.”

”One by one,” I agreed as she took a manila file out of her briefcase.

”Did you know Mike organizes your credit card statements by year, month, card, and the color of the card?”

Sadly, I didn't know that, because I never looked at the statements.

She handed me the folder, which seemed sort of scant. ”The bad news is that we didn't find anything illegal or even slightly shady. As advertised, Mike is as dull as a box of mud, but clean as a whistle. The good news is that you don't have any joint debts that you weren't aware of. He hasn't bought a house in another state or mortgaged the one you have without telling you. The interesting news is that you own both of the Hardee's franchises in town and the Baskin-Robbins. They are turning a handsome profit, by the way.”

”And to think I've been paying for my frozen yogurt all these years,” I muttered.

”The iffy news is that there are no suspicious charges on your personal credit cards. No jewelry receipts, no out-of-town restaurants, no hotels. But his lawyer, Bill Bodine, is giving me grief about handing over the cards for the accounting firm, so I'm thinking that's what he used.”

”You're probably right,” I told her. ”He went on a golf weekend in Destin with some friends a few months back. There should be a charge on one of our personal cards for that. And in February he went to a bachelor party for a college friend. There should be a charge for the restaurant in Nashville, plus a hotel stay. I don't see anything here. And you're right, it makes sense that he might consider money spent wooing a staff member a business expense.”

”Nice,” she chuckled. ”Just give me a little time. It shouldn't take too much persuasion to get those statements.”

”Why?”

”Because otherwise, we will reproduce every e-mail Mike ever sent Beebee, blow them up to poster size, and review them in open court. Where Mike's mother will see them.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. ”So we're using the I'm-telling-your-mom! strategy in court?”

She nodded solemnly. ”I didn't go to a fancy law school for nothing.”

”So I finished my version of events.” I said, handing her one hundred and twenty typed pages. ”My characterization is not at all balanced. I come out looking naive, but brave.”

Samantha snickered. ”Wow. You had a lot to get off your chest.”

”Yep. And I skimped on my 'vengeance' period.”

She read over the front page and grinned. ”Well, keep going. If nothing else, it's good therapy. And it's evidence of your frame of mind. Oh, yeah, any idea why a Maya Drake has been calling me, begging me to 'give you the encouragement you need' but refusing to tell me what that means?”

”Because she's resourceful and incredibly creepy,” I told her. ”She wants me to go into business with her ... in a way that would not make you happy.”

”You should stop there, so I have plausible deniability,” she said, holding up her hand in a Diana Ross-ish gesture.

”Agreed.”

Samantha lifted the picnic hamper with a grunt. ”Also, this is from your mother.”

”My mama sent me a care package through my divorce attorney. I'm going to have to hand you my grown-up card when you leave.” I opened the hamper to find carefully wrapped parcels of fudge, banana bread, cookies, divinity, hummingbird cake, mola.s.ses cookies, and a cheesecake. ”Apparently Mama wants me to emerge from this divorce weighing four hundred pounds. Want some fudge?”

”No, but I'll take a brownie,” she said. I tossed her a Saran-wrapped lump of chocolate-frosted future cellulite. ”Don't worry, my mother expresses emotions exclusively through carbs. It's why I was the only freshman on my floor to drop fifteen pounds as soon as I moved away from home.”