His head reeled as if he had been struck a killing blow. His world had completely shattered.
He needed to get out of there before he went mad. He did not trust his voice, indeed there were no words to say. He loosed the bouquet of flowers that had the very wordliesin their name onto the ground, before turning and leaving through the doorway. A uniformed officer barely got out of his way, as he rushed into the night.
Away from her.
* * *
Lily was stunned by what had just happened. That drug had been inside of Mr. Calabash? Rey had stuffed her beloved toy, the only thing she had from her father, with TheRage?
If he weren’t already dead, she’d kill him herself.
And now Simon, the one to whom she was so grateful, was looking at her as if he saw something monstrous. He did. He saw a drug dealer.
She shoved her hand into her wallet, and quickly produced the wad of cash that Rika had advanced to her, her eyes filled with tears.
“No, Simon. I needed the advance for my car repair.” Her hand was trembling, the cash making an obscene fan in front of Simon’s face. The lock of hair on his forehead danced and he drew it back with his fingers with a frustrated sigh.
“She one of your employees?” The detective asked Simon.
Lily drew in a deep breath. Was he about to fire her?
“Yes,” he said, looking at her. “In fact, she’s a valued employee, and she’s been working at the Staff Childcare Center as well as for me directly, at my home.”
Present tense. Still an employee, thank God. She didn’t care if her exhalation was loud enough to hear by everyone in the room. But what Lily didn’t know before was how much it mattered to her that Simon believe she was innocent. She did now.
That bastard Rey. Even dead on the floor, he was finding new ways to make her life hellish.
Still. He was dead. He’d died right in front of her. Her knees felt like jello, and tears burned in her eyes, although she couldn’t say for what. She’d stopped loving him long ago, staying with him because he’d beaten her down so much she thought she deserved no better.
Even so, it was going to take a long time to get over seeing what she’d just seen.
Everybody was staring at her. She cleared her throat, blinked hard, and spoke up. “Mr. Calabash was taken from the trailer that was broken into.”
Simon nodded, but Detective Gardner immediately asked, “Where and when did this break-in occur?”
Damn. Lily hadn’t reported it to the police. It sounded unbelievable, even to her.
“It was an internal matter involving one of my other employees,” Simon sounded like his usual self again. “I can corroborate that her residence was broken into while she was in the hospital, so we haven’t been able to fully inventory what had been taken at the time.”
Detective Gardner was jotting down notes while Simon continued. “Ms. Cooper’s paramount concern at the time was for her safety, and except for the night when the break-in was discovered, Ms. Cooper has been a guest in my home ever since.”
The detective slammed her notepad shut. Lily suspected that she was very lucky that Simon, a well-respected man and the biggest employer in town, was vouching for her.
Still, the detective’s gaze was uncomfortably piercing as she looked Lily up and down. “Don’t leave town, in case the boys from the DEA want to talk to you. Most likely they won’t, this guy was a two-bit player since he’s not showing up on our databases. Looks like he might have been stealing from the one they’re really after, a bigwig namedEl Monstruo.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Lily murmured, and as soon as the detective said she was free to go, Simon walked over to her, and she impulsively leapt up and hugged him.
To her relief, his arms went around her too. His hug was stiff and awkward, and he stepped back quickly, brushing.
The irony of her new situation. Lily wanted to laugh with the absurdity of it, but then she would cry.
She was now forced to stay once again, when the reason for fleeing in the first place was lying dead just a few feet away, the threat gone forever. But behind Simon, she spotted the ribboned, beautifully wrapped paper cone, with the tips of Calla lilies peeking out. Discarded, on the floor. The person who had been holding them, who had meant to please her with them, long gone.
And so, too, was her reason to stay.
