As she started back to Herb Krause’s cottage, Tracy had to admit that in a pinch, having family was important. She knew that from experience, because for all practical purposes, she had no one. She was newly divorced, abandoned by her parents and the majority of her friends. To add insult to injury, she had been transported to a mosquito-ridden swamp and forced to grovel for money to buy groceries.
At least CJ, who was probably sunning himself in the prison yard at Victorville, knew where his next meal was coming from. So what if he breakfasted on powdered eggs, stale toast and watery coffee? No matter what other trouble he ran into in the next twenty years, at least the Feds would make sure his stomach was never empty.
That was something, at least. She hoped CJ was learning to count his blessings. In the decades ahead he would need to focus on every single one.
“Well, here she comes.”
Wanda Gray set The Pirate’s Bride beside her on the lounge chair under the jacaranda tree in her front yard and watched the new landlady trudging up the dirt road toward her cottage.
“Kenny…” She aimed her voice toward the screen door and her husband. “It’s that Deloche woman, come for her check. Don’t you interfere now. I’m going to handle this.”
She thought she heard a grunt, but she wasn’t sure. A grunt was as much as she got out of Ken these days. She was sorry she hadn’t circled the date of their last conversation on the calendar. No matter. A calendar that old had already been recycled into cheap napkins or some of that nasty-looking stationary no normal person ever wrote a letter on.
“Don’t trouble yourself none,” she said under her breath. “Why would you start now, seeing as you haven’t done a blessed thing around the house since Pluto was a pup?” She probably should have circled that date, too.
She had no intention of standing to greet the Deloche woman. She took off her glasses and set them next to her book before she smoothed her sundress over pudgy knees. One hand went to her lacquered red curls, the roots freshly tinted with her favorite copper shimmer. But that was as much primping as she was going to do. So what if Tracy Deloche was as skinny as one of those girls on Sex in the City? Wanda Gray was no second fiddle, not even at fifty-six.
What exactly did the young woman have to be snooty about, anyway? Sure, she owned this twenty-five-acre spit of land on Palmetto Grove Key, across the bay from the town of Palmetto Grove, and it was probably worth millions. But exactly what good was it doing her? Ms. Deloche was what they called land-poor, and it served her right for calling a dump like this Happiness Key, and thinking that everybody and his Uncle Jack would come flocking just because of its fancy name.
From what Wanda could tell, the Deloche woman was going to have one heck of a time getting rid of the place, what with the economy the way it was in Florida, plus all those people at Wild Florida screaming because the Army Corps of Engineers had given Ms. Deloche’s ex a permit for development, then running the whole thing through the courts. Add the folks who wanted to save every inch of the mangroves, and the ones who thought increasing traffic and widening the road would damage that old Indian mound. Ms. Deloche had one fine mess on her hands, and right now Wanda aimed to add to it.
With enthusiasm.
Today the landlady was dressed in baggy black capris and a matching bikini top, with a gauzy white shirt exposing everything but her shoulders and arms. Her midriff, chest and neck were taut and tan; her dark brown hair fell straight as an arrow on its way to her shoulders. She had one of those smiles money could buy, and the kind of unlined skin that was best slathered with sunblock. Wanda hoped she wasn’t thinking that far ahead. A line or two would serve her right.
By the time Tracy finally arrived, Wanda was waiting, fingertips steepled, like she had all the time in the world.