“Well, then, why don’t you put them bags up and I’ll wait inside out of the cold?” Without pausing for his agreement, she pivoted and walked into A Cuppa Joe.
Tommy unlocked the car door and set the bags in the back. As the plastic sides sagged, he saw two cartons of cigarettes, a six-pack of beer, chips and three large bags of candy. Tucked between the beer and the Enquirer was a slim brown bag, the kind used at the local liquor stores. Booze, chocolate and a gossip rag…the basic requirements of life.
After closing and locking the door, he strode down the sidewalk and into the coffee shop. The woman was standing at the counter, head tilted back, studying the menu on the wall. She’d pushed the hood off her head, leaving her hair sticking out like tufts of straw, and, like the night before, she gave off an air of watchfulness. “Does that offer go for plain coffee or the grande-mocha-latte-chino good stuff?”
“Whatever you want.”
A twenty-something girl with bottled black hair and deep purple lips waited idly for their order, tapping an orange fingernail on the counter. A person could be forgiven for thinking she was already in the Halloween spirit, but she looked like that every day of the year. After the woman ordered a caramel-hazelnut something-or-other, Tommy asked for his usual—high-octane Brazilian blend with a slice of cream-cheese-filled pumpkin bread.
“Make that two slices,” the woman said with a sly smile. “I’ll find a table.”
Midafternoon, with only a couple of other customers, that was no hardship. She chose one near the front window but away from the draft of the door. By the time Tommy set down the tray with their food, she’d removed her coat and sat, legs crossed, hands clasped on the tabletop. Her fingers were short, stubby and nicotine stained, her nails blunt and unpolished. The skin on her hands, like on her face, was weathered and worn. Not by work, he suspected. She didn’t strike him as a woman who indulged in hard work.
And she didn’t strike him as a woman who would have even the vaguest connection to Ellie. Ellie was so elegant and polished and…just different.
“I didn’t get your name,” he said as he set a tall foamy cup and a saucer with bread in front of her.
“I didn’t offer it.” She swiped a finger in the whipped cream that topped her drink, licked it clean, then shrugged. “Martha Dempsey.”
“Are you here on vacation? Visiting friends? Just passing through?”
Picking up her fork, she wagged it in his direction. “That’s the bad thing about cops. They’re always asking questions.”
“We’re just curious people.” And he wasn’t asking even a fraction of the questions running through his mind. Who are you? Why are you here? How do you know Ellie? What do you want from her?
“I seen you last night. At the restaurant down the street. With that pregnant black girl. Is she your girl?” There was an undertone of something—disapproval, bigotry—that made her voice coarse, ugly.
“I like to think she could have been if my buddy hadn’t met her first.” He’d liked Anamaria from the first time they’d met, but Robbie, she insisted, had been her destiny. God knows, she’d certainly turned him around. The shallow Calloway brother, the irresponsible one, had taken to marriage and impending fatherhood as well as or better than any of his more responsible brothers.
“She’s not your kind,” Martha said dismissively.
Before he could ask just how she meant that, she shifted her gaze outside to a temporary sign in the square, announcing the date and time of the annual Halloween celebration. “This isn’t a bad little town. I’m thinking I could live out my last days here.”
And what would Ellie think of that? “I’ve lived all my days here, except for four years in college. I like it.” He stirred sugar into his coffee, then took a careful sip before asking, “Where do you live now?”
“Atlanta. Big place. You can stay twenty years in the same house and still not know your neighbor’s name.” She gave him another of those sly looks. “I bet you know pretty much everything about everyone in town. Or, at least, you think you do.”
“I’m not sure you can ever know everything about a person.” He was probably the only one in town who didn’t have much in the way of secrets. The only major events in his life—his mother’s alcoholism, her leaving when he was five and abandoning him, his falling in love with Ellie and her not loving him back—were common knowledge. He had nothing to hide.
“What do you know about Ellie Chase?”
He stilled in the act of reaching for another bite of pumpkin bread. Laying his fork carefully on the plate, he folded his hands around his coffee cup instead. “She’s got the best restaurant in town. Everyone likes her. She’s good to work for. She’s active in the community.” He paused. “I know you know her.”
Ellie hadn’t actually said that. Martha Dempsey was just someone who wanted something, she’d said. Someone from the past she never talked about, he’d inferred.
Martha’s smile was crooked. “A long time ago,” she said. “I hadn’t seen her since she was a teenager.”
“Is she the reason you came here?”
She studied him a moment, then took a drink of coffee, slurping to get whipped cream, as well. With a drop clinging to her upper lip, she said, “What you call curiosity, Mr. Police Detective, some people consider plain old nosiness.”
“Is she?”
After another drink, she shook her head. “Her being here is just a happy coincidence.”
“I don’t believe in coincidence.” And Ellie certainly hadn’t seemed happy.
That earned a sharp laugh from her. “I don’t believe in little green men from Mars, neither, but that don’t mean they aren’t out there. Now…tell me about this Halloween festival.”
A shrill whistle startled Ellie, who’d been staring off into the distance. She shifted her gaze to the door of her office where Sherry, one of the waitresses, stood, a takeout bag in hand.
“I called your name three times. You imagining yourself on some Caribbean beach with a hot cabana boy?”
If only her mind had wandered someplace so pleasant…But no, she’d been distant in years, not so much in mileage. “You bet,” she lied, forcing a smile. “The sun was warm, the sand was endless and the rum never stopped flowing.”
“Well, come back to reality, where the sky is gray, the temperature is cold and the rain hasn’t stopped falling.” Sherry held up the bag. “Joe’s order is ready.”
Ellie looked blankly at the bag before remembering: Joe Saldana had called in an order to go, and she’d offered to deliver it to him. He’d promised her a tall chai tea, his own special blend, as a fee.
“I can take it for you.”
“You’re married, Sherry,” Ellie reminded her as she rose from the chair, then took her jacket from the coat tree in the corner.
“But there’s
