“You didn’t break her heart,” Grace said. “Neal will be responsible for that all on his own. Just like Joel is responsible for his own bad behavior. It wasn’t your fault. I’m never letting either of you go out on a date again until we have a private detective check the man out, though.”
“You’ve got a PI on retainer?” Sarah teased.
Grace opened the shop’s back door and flipped on the lights in the kitchen. “Not yet, but I will have when y’all get over your broken hearts.”
“What about you? Are we supposed to have any man you date checked out?” Sarah got the cleaning supplies out of the utility room.
“You don’t have to worry about that for a few more years,” Grace answered. “All I have to do is introduce a guy to Audrey, and he won’t stop running until he reaches the ocean.”
“Hey, what’s going on?” An older woman with dyed red hair and enough wrinkles to prove her four-hundred-dollar face cream did not work, flung open the back door. “Audrey said y’all were down here cleaning up.”
“How was the cruise, Beezy?” Grace asked.
Beatrice Larson, better known in Devine as Beezy, had grown up with Sarah and Grace’s mama and had been her best friend. When their mother passed away, Beezy had stepped in to be a surrogate mother tothem. They both left what they were doing and wrapped her up in a three-way hug.
“Lord, I’m glad you’re home,” Sarah said.
“Cruise was fun, but once is enough on a big old floating hotel.” Beezy sat down on a tall stool and frowned. “I can tell by both your faces that something isn’t right. I knew I shouldn’t have gone and left you. Where is Macy?”
Grace pulled out three coffee mugs. “She’s got one of her headaches. Raelene is helping take care of her.”
“Liz and Molly both had headaches like that,” Beezy said. “Raelene? Is that Hilda Andrews’s granddaughter? Why is she taking care of Macy?”
“We should start at the beginning,” Grace said as she put on a pot of coffee and sprayed foamy cleaner inside the ovens.
Sarah told her the story of Joel and about being at the motel and seeing Neal and Darla Jo while she emptied the refrigerator and wiped down all the shelves. “Grace and I have to tell Macy, don’t we?”
“Of course you have to tell her,” Beezy said and then poured each of them a cup of coffee. “It wouldn’t be right to keep it from her and let her fall into a life of misery with a cheating husband. I’ve said from the beginning there was something wrong with that man. He’s too perfect, with his chiseled cheekbones and his long, dark lashes and all that romantic tomfoolery. Macy fell in love too fast. If he’s trying to talk her into giving him power of attorney, he might be more than just a philanderer.”
“We know. What are we going to do?” Grace groaned before taking a sip of her coffee.
“Do you think Neal put something in her food that would cause her to have this migraine? Is he going to take advantage of her addled state and ask her to move money even without power of attorney?” asked Sarah. “She hasn’t had this kind of headache in at least sixmonths. It seems strange that one would pop up after she’s been out to eat with him.”
Beezy took a sip. “Honey, he wouldn’t do something stupid like that until she puts his name on her bank accounts. But we do need to make sure of his motives and even more sure he really is who he says he is. You girls are computer savvy, so get on it.”
“I tried looking him up this morning...” Sarah paused. “On the internet...” Another pause. “After you told me. But the Neal Monroes I found didn’t look a thing like him. There was one who was ninety-two years old and died last year,” she admitted.
“Then I guess he’s clean—or maybe he’s stolen the identity of a dead man,” Beezy said in a low voice. She leaned over to scan the room, as if looking for someone to pop out from behind the bread and sugar bins. “We’d make good detectives. Maybe we should give up the doughnut shop and open a PI business.”
“I hate to tell her that there’s even a possibility she’s been conned on top of everything,” Grace grumbled. “But right now, the thought of him talking her into moving money today is downright scary.”
Beezy shook her finger at Grace. “She hasn’t jumped into the fire yet, darlin’ girl. We can save her if this man is cheating on her, or trying to swindle her, or both.”
Sarah headed straight for the small office where she did all the bookwork for the business. It had been a storage closet at one time and was just big enough for a desk and chair. The modem for the internet service for both the business and the house was in the desk. She opened it and pulled all three of the plug-ins.
“What are you doing in there?” Grace asked.
“Unplugging the internet to make it tougher for Macy to transfer money,” Sarah answered.
“She’s got unlimited data on her phone,” Grace said.
“Crap!” Sarah fussed. “I’d forgotten about that.”
Beezy chuckled. “Smart girl for trying, though.”
“We can’t leave it off forever,” Grace said with a sigh. “Macy’s got such a big heart that she’ll forgive him if he begs and says his indiscretion was just a one-time thing and that Darla Jo seduced him.”
“Maybe for cheatingone time, but if he’s not who he says he is and he and Darla Jo are running a scam, I think she’d have better sense than to forgive him for that. We need to tell her, and I mean really soon. That way she can deal with him.”
