Chapter Twenty-five
The next day, I called my island friends.
First Ava. “Guess whose crazy red-headed friend is moving to St. Marcos in two weeks?” I asked her.
Ava shouted so loud I had to pull the phone away from my ear. “For real? You moving here for real?”
“I am. I bought Estate Annalise.”
“You crazy. Anyone buy that jumbie house crazy. Good crazy, brave crazy. But then I know that about you already.”
“Well, that jumbie house won’t be ready for me to live in for a long time. I need a friend who’d like a roommate for a few months.”
“And that friend be me, of course,” she said.
“I’m going to need more help, the kind of help that requires a truck and a lot of experience on the west end of the island,” I said, putting my drop line in the water.
Ava bit. “Rashidi good for that. You got his number?”
I didn’t so she gave it to me. One issue solved. I called Rashidi next.
I was unsure how to begin. “This is Ava’s friend Katie. How’s it going?” I asked him.
He made things just right immediately. “I good, but I hear a rumor some continental lady trying to buy Annalise. That be you?”
“Not only tried, but was successful,” I said.
“Wah? You buy the jumbie place? You for real?”
“I’m afraid I am. I think I’m going to need some help. Ava suggested I call you.”
“No worries. Any red-haired friend of Ava a friend of mine.”
I told Rashidi I needed an agent to help me buy a truck before I got back on-island. He informed me I needed a pack of dogs more.
“Locals scared of dogs. All dogs. You gonna need them to watch over Annalise once you start prettying her up and putting supplies and things there. And you gotta have dogs dem to protect you if you live up in the bush. I get you some good dogs, three or four be about right.”
I hadn’t anticipated a pack of guard dogs, but I could see his point. And he was the local, not me. If I remembered correctly, I liked dogs. Or maybe it was cats I liked. We’d had both when I was a kid, twenty years before. It didn’t really matter, though, as Rashidi and I were talking about outside, working guard dogs. I wouldn’t have to deal with slobber or dog hair or bodily functions.
“So, if I wired you the money, could I get you to pick up a truck for me? I found a used one for sale in the St. Marcos Source online. It looks like exactly what I need.”
“Yah mon. Why don’t you let me drive it ’round first, make sure it OK.”
“Wow, thanks. I’m going to pay you for your help, of course.”
“Now why you want to insult a man like that? We new friends.” First Ava, then Rashidi. It was raining blessings.
“Fine, thank you. Then I’m at least going to feed you when I see you.”
“That I let you do, for true.”
He hung up, promising to check out the truck and start the hunt for the right dogs immediately.
More issues resolved. I pinched myself. It hurt. This was actually going to happen.
I continued making my mega-list, because that was just the way I rolled. I had only four big things left on it for Dallas. I needed to give my two-week notice at work, list my condo, secure the services of a moving company, and finish things gracefully with Nick.
I told Gino that same day. My decision shocked him, if his slack face was any indication. That or he had a mini stroke.
“Take a leave of absence instead. We can give you up to a year,” Gino said.
That was gracious, especially given the disastrous outcome of Zane’s trial and my new internet fame.
“Thank you, Gino, but I want to make a clean break,” I said.
“Is this because I made you take the McMillan case? I’m sorry for that. I had no idea that witness would turn,” he said, the epitome of concern and kindness.
I winced. Emily and Nick must not have told him the story behind the story, or he’d have kicked me out of the partnership. Instead, he felt responsible. Which in turn made me feel guilty. I’d been wasting a lot of time on guilty lately. I’d been causing my own trouble.
“I’m not leaving because of that. Thank you, though. None of us knew about Sherry.” And now I was going to hell for lying, but no good could come of fessing up now. “It was God’s way of making me earn the double fees,” I said, and Gino laughed.
Wrapping up my law practice took most of my attention over the next two weeks, but there were no complications, other than warding off the morbid curiosity of the onlookers who lurked outside my office door whispering to each other. “Did Gino fire her?” “It’s probably because of the McMillan case. Did you hear she had a nervous breakdown in the courtroom? I saw it on YouTube.” Seriously, if YouTube’s world headquarters burned to the ground, the authorities would be crazy not to take a hard look at me. But I ignored them all. Their opinions didn’t matter to me anymore, and I had things left to do.
My condo building had a waiting list of potential buyers. It was on McKinney Avenue in the uptown area, close to downtown Dallas and humming with the energy burned by the upwardly mobile. It was either trés chic or way cool, depending on your demographic. I found someone eager to pay my price and close immediately. Not only that, but the couple recognized me from the TV coverage of Zane’s trial. Super. And guess what? They’d even seen the YouTube video. I asked. Now they’d have stories to tell at their dinner parties about how they bought the place from the Paula Abdul of defense attorneys.
With the condo sold furnished, I had much less to ship, which was good because shipping to the Caribbean was quite pricey.
“You realize that mid-September is the peak of hurricane season?” the representative from the moving company asked me when I called. “Some people would rather store their belongings until the season is over, then ship them.”
I hadn’t thought about that. Wasn’t that why God invented insurance, though?
“I want to ship now,” I said.
No escape hatches. All in. And everything fell into place so easily that I knew it was meant to be.
Except for one thing. The finish-with-Nick thing.
After deleting the email Nick sent after the McMillan trial, I’d hidden from him at work like a yellow-bellied sapsucker. When I caught a glimpse of him, I ducked into the bathroom or reversed course as if I’d forgotten something. I wasn’t yet ready to explain myself about anything. Like ignoring his olive branch. Or moving. The awkwardness between us. I wanted to wait until the day before I left to talk to him, so I wouldn’t have to face him again afterwards. The last minute in the last hour of the last day, if I had my choice. Bwock bwock, said the chicken.
I rehearsed every word I was going to say to him. The gist of it? I wanted to tell him I was sorry. For Shreveport, for the McMillan trial, for everything. That I appreciated his email, and that he had nothing left to apologize for to me. I knew he was my true friend before Shreveport, and that I’d driven him away. I needed him to know that I was leaving. That I was taking his advice and accepting help. Granted, it was my kind of help from a jumbie house and friends I barely knew, but I would leave that part unsaid.
And when the conversation was over, then I would let it go, and I would have the closure I craved. After that, I didn’t ever want to see him again. Unless he declared undying love for me. Which he wouldn’t.
The days flew by. I didn’t see Collin or Emily as much as I’d hoped. When I did, it was hard. They kept trying to talk me out of the best decision of my life.
Collin tried emotional pressure. “You can’t sever your ties to our past, Katie. This is where Mom and Dad raised us. You’re going to lose your connection to everything that has always mattered to you.”
Emily worked the same theme, without the sledgehammer. “You can change jobs and condos here, you know. You don’t have to run halfway around the world. Besides, I haven’t even taught you to ride a horse properly yet.”
When the emotional blackm
ail didn’t work, Collin suggested a compromise. “Back out of this purchase for now. Wait a month and I’ll come with you for a visit. We’ll work this through together. It would be good for me to go to St. Marcos and face what happened to Mom and Dad, too.”
Finally, Emily broke. “What about me, with my best friend so far away? I’m at least coming to help you get settled, and I won’t take no for an answer.”
Now this was the kind of emotional gesture I could work with. “Of course!” I said. We booked her a flight to follow me the day after I left. I could show her a good time on St. Marcos and pay her back for all she had done for me lately, for the embarrassment I’d made her a part of. St. Marcos was a long way from Amarillo, even from Dallas, and she had never been to the Caribbean.
And then, the night after the painful but well-meaning going away party the firm threw for me at Uncle Julio’s, the party where I spent the entire evening fake-laughing at McZillion jokes and eyeing the exit, I got an email from Nick. Nick who had not come to my party.
I opened it cautiously, hoping for a miracle but expecting the boogeyman to jump out.
To:
[email protected] (Hailey & Hart, All Attorneys and Staff)
From:
[email protected] Subject: Out of the Office
I will be out of the office from August 15 through August 29. If this is an emergency, please write “Emergency” in the subject of your email, or call me on my mobile phone.
It was a Thursday. I was flying out Saturday. And he was already gone. My Friday afternoon speech would never happen. I would never see him again. Never.
Months of fighting it had made no difference. I loved this man. I needed to get over it and move on. But how was I supposed to turn my Only One into nothing? I couldn’t. Not yet, anyway.
Well, that was that, then. I drew three lines through the last item on my list, ripping a hole in the paper as I did. I was ready to go. But I would keep my same cell phone number. Just in case.
~~~