By Invitation Only Read online

  I called another Uber, which arrived minutes later. I’d find another nail salon. They were a dime a dozen. I’d go to one on the other side of town. Big deal. Who cared? I did. I was embarrassed. Thanks, Alejandro.

  I went home and called Judy. She didn’t take my call. Well, maybe she was legitimately busy. She’d call back. When six o’clock became eight o’clock and she hadn’t returned my call, I texted her.

  Judy, please call me. I pushed Send. Whoosh! Off it went.

  Bing! Her reply was swift and cruel.

  My lawyer says I shouldn’t be talking to you unless I want to be a part of the FBI’s investigation, which I do not. About the gala: Leave your paperwork with your doorman, I’ll pick it up. How are you and Alejandro planning to pay us back? I mean my parents too, Susan. You defrauded ninety-year-old people. Nice.

  I wanted to answer her and say Well, you’ve always been a bitch anyway and I didn’t do it, Alejandro did, but I did not. But her response told me a few things I didn’t want to hear. The FBI was coming. I was a social persona non grata. And I was guilty of Alejandro’s crimes.

  I was going to do something I had not done in years. Emotional eating, pizza. I called Pizza Castle and ordered a pie with pepperoni, onions, and mushrooms. They said it would be forty-five minutes for a delivery. I said that was fine. The fellow taking the order sort of gasped when I gave him my name and address. I thought, Oh, great, he recognizes my name, and popped the cork on a bottle of champagne left over from one party or another. It was the only thing chilled, and I thought the carbonation would pair nicely with the tomato sauce of the pizza.

  I took a deep sip right from the bottle and turned on the news. There was Alejandro, being led away by federal marshals. Again. There must’ve been nothing else to talk about on the news, because my husband’s face was plastered on every network. He’d worn his navy suit to his arraignment. He was still a handsome devil, no matter what. Michael had come by this morning to pick it up and take it to him. But he had done something so terrible, the disgrace of it would follow us to the grave and beyond into eternity. This lying son of a bitch that I’d been faithful to for all these years just deliberately ruined my life and the lives of everybody I knew.

  “You think you’re so smart! You’re a monster!” I screamed so loud he could probably hear me at the MCC. Then I got a pad of paper and a pencil, sank into a chair at the kitchen table and cried. I took several big gulps of the bubbly and began to make a list of things to do.

  Number one, divorce lawyer. Yep. I needed a divorce lawyer. I’d ask Michael to recommend someone. It would not be a complicated divorce. There would be no division of property and assets because there’d be nothing to divide! I just wanted to be sure no one could sue me for what Alejandro had done.

  “Asshole!”

  I screamed and took another few gulps and then wept some more. My life was ruined! I wouldn’t be welcome anywhere! For the rest of my life! I was a pariah! Filth! Scum! This is what you did to your loyal and faithful wife? And your beautiful, innocent daughter who literally adores you?

  “You’re a monster!” I screamed and took another gulp. I was sobbing then. How could he do this to us?

  Okay, get a grip on yourself and think! I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand.

  Number two, legal protection. I needed someone to defend me against some kind of agents of the federal government trying to take my jewelry and our artwork and my silver. I made a note to ask Alejandro’s lawyers for their advice. Maybe we could reach some kind of a settlement with the government, leaving me with enough to eke out some kind of meager living.

  Number three, apartment. I was going to need a new place to live. Someplace that was discreet, for sure. I made a note to find a broker and to have a civil discussion with our board president, Mr. Keenan, about how this might play itself out and to try to put together a time frame.

  I had some stocks and bonds, enough jewelry to choke a camel, and who knows what else was around here that was worth confiscation? I decided to take a walk around the house and see what I might identify as things we had owned before we got married. There wasn’t much. All of my china and silver was bought after we were married. And how would I know if the things we bought to set up housekeeping were bought with dirty money? When did Alejandro’s life of crime and deception begin? Ten years ago? Twenty years ago? To make that determination was going to require someone like a financial forensic accountant, if such a person even existed. So far as I could tell, the only things I really owned were my old car and my engagement ring. That wouldn’t get me far.

  I continued swigging champagne. Diane had called me last night. Diane! I had roughly three hundred people’s names, e-mails, cell phone numbers, and home addresses in my address book, and Diane was the only person in the entire world who called. She might be the only thing close to a genuine friend I had. I needed to call her back and tell her what was really going on. And then I started to cry and have a conversation with the thin air.

  Damn you, Alejandro! Damn you to hell! What have you done to us? And you were screwing Nadia all this time? You liar! You damn liar! You make me sick with your lies! Where am I supposed to go to get a job? There isn’t a company in this entire United States of America that would trust me with a rubber band! I’m going to finish my life in poverty because of your damn endless greed? Don’t you know how regular people hate rich people? They love to see us fail! And the farther we fall, the better! I got thrown out of my nail salon this afternoon! A nail salon! If Francine did that to me, what would happen everywhere else. Damn it, Alejandro!

  The house phone rang. I picked up.

  “Pizza delivery,” Frank said.

  “Send him up,” I said.

  I went to my purse and took out some money. My doorbell rang. I wiped my eyes, and I imagine I smeared mascara from one side of my face to the other.

  “Coming!” I called out, carrying the champagne and a fistful of cash to the door.

  I opened the door, took the box, handed him thirty dollars, and he snapped a picture of my face with his phone. Then he ran to the elevator, where his friend was holding the door.

  “What kind of person are you? Shame on you!” I slammed the door and thought to myself, Oh, go to hell.

  Chapter 26

  Diane Is Awesome

  “I feel terrible for her,” Diane said.

  “Me too, but I’d be surprised if she didn’t know SOMETHING!” Virnell said.

  We were having breakfast and I was thinking about Susan. She had been too tipsy to talk last night. I couldn’t blame her for that. If I had a husband who disgraced me the way Alejandro did her, I’d probably tie one on too! Even Mom and Floyd agreed.

  “You know, she might be getting her comeuppance now, but I still feel sorry for her,” Mom said. “Would you pass the pepper, please?”

  I picked up the pepper mill and placed it by her fork.

  “Thanks,” she said and gave it a few grinds over her eggs.

  “She’s not really a bad person, once you get past the pretension,” Floyd said. “She was just doing what smart women do.”

  “And what might that be?” I asked.

  “She acted like that because she was an extension of Alejandro. Every man has a fantasy of the perfect wife. She was trying to be his fantasy. You know what I mean?”

  “That’s ridiculous,” I said. “Another biscuit?” I offered the bread basket to him and he took two.

  “Thanks,” he said. “Pass the jelly, please?”

  I put the cut-glass jar of jelly in front of him. Using a crystal jelly jar was my nod to gentrified living. I had a thing against putting commercial containers on the table. No ketchup bottle, no cartons of juice or commercial jars of jelly, even if the jelly was jelly we made.

  “No, it isn’t ridiculous to try and be your husband’s fantasy,” Mom said. “Think about it.”

  “And I’ll bet you a dollar that she’s about to become a very different person,” Floyd said.


  “We’ll see,” I said. “I’ll bet her mind is going in a million different directions at once.”

  “The poor thing,” Mom said. “Well, we’ve still got soup to put up in jars waiting for us.”

  “And corn bread to bake,” I said. “Floyd, if we’ve got eggs, send them up to the store, will you?”

  “You bet. And I’ve got trees to prune,” Floyd said.

  “I’ll call Susan tonight,” I said.

  Mom and I did the dishes and Floyd went outside to meet his crew. When everything was put away, we walked down to the farm stand together and opened up.

  “The days are getting longer and the air is getting warmer,” Mom said. “I love to see the first signs of spring.”

  “Me too. And I love when our daffodils peek through the dirt. I remember planting them with Fred when he was about twelve. I think we put in thirty-six bulbs.”

  I took the pots of soup out of the cooler, putting one on the table and the rest of them on the unlit stove. With a large spoon I began scraping away the congealed fat on top.

  “We must have a thousand daffodils now,” Mom said. “But if you divide them every year, that’s what happens. They multiply like rabbits!”

  Mom took the pot when I was finished, and using a ladle, she filled each jar halfway with only broth until there was no more to dispense. Then, using a small cup, she divided the vegetables, filling the jars to the bottom of their necks. I took a spoon and sampled the soup.

  “Ham hocks did the trick,” I said. “If it’s this good cold, I can’t wait to taste it when it’s hot.”

  “What did I tell you? Sing, my little turnips! Sing!”

  We both laughed then.

  “Well, I’ve missed dividing my bulbs a couple of years, but not many. We should grow daffodils to sell too. They seem to love the dirt here.”

  “And zinnias too. When I was a girl, this yard was covered in them.”

  “It was?”

  “Yep. I planted them with my mother. Every color too. Fuchsia, purple, scarlet, and all kinds of color combinations that were so exciting to me.”

  “Well, when the daffodils start coming in, let’s put some zinnias in too. Why not?”

  The remainder of the day went like that. I baked a mountain of corn bread, cooled it, and wrapped big pieces of it in plastic wrap. Then I labeled them, weighed them, and priced them. And Mom sealed the jars of soup in boiling water, cooled, and labeled them.

  I took the fat pink stick of chalk and went outside to change the blackboard. I erased stop the car! you need pie! and wrote, stop the car! you need soup! I added, and corn bread! in parentheses. Late that afternoon, when people were on their way home from work, we did a steady business selling quarts of soup, corn bread, and small boxes of Carolina White Rice. Everyone loved to serve rice with vegetable soup, which technically was no longer vegetarian with the addition of the hocks.

  “What kinds of pies do you have?” a customer asked Mom.

  “Frozen,” she said. “Pecan, apple, and strawberry rhubarb.”

  “I’ll take apple, thanks!”

  “Be right back,” Mom said, heading for the freezer.

  I was ringing up her sale when my cell phone buzzed. I looked at it. It was Alden calling.

  “Mom? Finish up for me, okay? I have to take this call.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” she said, and I moved aside. “Did you ring up the pie?”

  “No, ma’am. Add it in.”

  I walked outside into the cool afternoon air.

  “Hello?” I said and pulled my sweater around me.

  “Hey, Diane, it’s me, Alden. You got a minute?”

  “Sure! What’s new?”

  “Um, Alejandro Cambria is in the slammer? What the hell?”

  “I know, but who knew? Turns out he had his hand deep in the cookie jar. I don’t think he’s ever getting out of jail.”

  “And I thought he was such a nice guy,” Alden said. “When he wasn’t on the phone, that is.”

  “I think he was a nice guy who did a very bad thing. You know, hate the sin, not the sinner.”

  “How’s Susan holding up? She’s got to be completely destroyed.”

  “I’m pretty sure she’s devastated. I’m supposed to talk to her tonight. I’ll let you know. Right now, I feel pretty sorry for her.”

  “You don’t think she knew what he was doing?”

  “Not the first clue. I don’t think she had even an inkling.”

  “How can you be so sure about that? I mean, if we were married, you’d know what I was doing all the time, wouldn’t you?”

  I got stuck on the if we were married part of his question.

  “If we were married? Um, I’d trust you, probably the same way Susan trusted her husband. She’s pretty wrapped up in all kinds of volunteer and board work. And to be honest, I don’t think she really understands securities. The night of our party, the one you so perfectly engineered and executed, I asked her what he did for a living. She explained it in such a simplified way that either she thought we were a bunch of bumpkins that wouldn’t get it or she didn’t really understand it herself.”

  I figured there was no harm in a little flattery.

  “Really. Wow. Well, I’m no financial wizard either, but from what I’ve been reading online, hedge funds have more tentacles than a science fiction monster. I think it’s a world people would never understand unless they lived in it.”

  “I’m sure you’re right.”

  There was silence then. I didn’t want to ask about Betsy. And whatever his reason was, he wasn’t asking about me.

  I said, “You should come by. Mom and I just made awesome soup and corn bread.”

  “Really?” he said. “Did you say awesome?”

  “I think I did,” I said.

  “Let me see if I can shake loose over here. How’s seven?”

  “Seven’s just perfect. See you then.”

  I was just thinking that if he came by the store, I’d give him a jar or two to take home. And he thought I invited him for dinner. Talk about fate: This was divine intervention if ever there was.

  “Uh, Mom?”

  “Yes?” She looked at me and I knew she knew something was up. “Spit it out.”

  “Alden’s coming for dinner tonight,” I said.

  “Really? Too bad I’ll miss him. Your brother’s taking me to the Citadel Mall tonight.”

  “Since when do you go shopping at night at the Citadel Mall?”

  “Since I want to be out of the house when he comes so that nature can take its course. Now, please go home and wash your hair. And for heaven’s sake, put on some makeup and perfume.”

  “I don’t have any perfume,” I said.

  She looked at me though slits of eyes and her mouth was stretched wide and taut in exasperation.

  “That’s pitiful,” she said.

  “I don’t need it,” I said and then remembered I had some samples the ladies who did my hair and makeup in Chicago gave me.

  “Well, for heaven’s sake, try to be alluring, if you know what I mean.”

  “He’s coming for a bowl of soup, Miss Virnell. Not a rendezvous with Julia Roberts.”

  “A little more allure and a little less soup wouldn’t kill you,” she said. “And don’t call me Miss Virnell.”

  There was no ruining my good mood. We closed the store at six but I went back to the house at five. I took a shower, washed my hair, and blew it out as carefully as I could. I had let the girl in Chicago reshape it so it looked a lot more like the year 2017 than 2000. Even I could make it actually look like something. I could hear Floyd in the other room arguing with Mom.

  “I hate the Citadel Mall,” he said.

  “Your sister has a date tonight with Alden,” she said.

  “She does?” He said this with too much amazement in his voice for my blood.

  “I can hear you! ‘She’ is the cat’s mother!”

  “I’ll take you to the Cracker Barrel for dinn
er,” Floyd said. “And I’ll take you to Barnes & Noble to look around. But please don’t make me go to the mall.”

  “Go warm up the truck,” she said and stuck her head in my room. “Get your business done by nine thirty. I doubt if I can keep him out any longer than that.”

  “Mom!” I pretended to be grossed out, but the truth was, she was hilarious.

  I set the dining room table for Alden and me, wishing I had flowers for the center or candles, but that might have been too much. Candles and flowers might have made him nervous. Or made me nervous. In any case, I had made a decision to let go of my inhibitions and worries over relationships. If I couldn’t trust Alden to treat me the right way, there wasn’t a man on the planet I could trust.

  I made a pot of rice and put the soup on the stove to warm up. I wrapped the corn bread in aluminum foil and put it in the oven on low heat. I looked around to see if we had any booze in the house and I couldn’t find a drop, except for the cheap sherry my mother liked to sip on occasion when she said her bones were cold. That stuff was so terrible. It was too late to run to a liquor store. I could have raided Floyd’s liquor cabinet, but I thought better of that too. So I did what southerners do when all else fails. I made a pot of sweet tea.

  It was six fifteen. I hoped Susan would still be sober, so I called her. She answered right away.

  “Hey!” I said. “How are you?”

  “Well, for someone whose life was completely shattered, I’m doing okay, I guess.”

  “You want to talk? I’m happy to listen. I’ve got plans at seven, but until then, I’m all yours.”

  “You are too nice, Diane. In fact, you might be the nicest person in my life right now.”

  “Oh, Susan, tell me what’s the worst part of all of this, for you to handle, I mean.”

  “That’s a good question.” I heard her sigh so hard, it broke my heart a little. “I think the worst part is the sweeping betrayal and the lies on top of lies.”

  “Yeah, when I find out someone’s lied to me I have a hard time ever believing them again.”