A Conflict of Interest Read online

  Sarcasm always started an interview right. “I need the job.”

  “Might as well tell me why you’re slumming.”

  “Slumming?” His attitude sucked. “Is that how you think of your employees?”

  “Of course not, but a doctor who can make your kind of salary doesn’t wake up one day with a yen to do retail.”

  “I’m suspended right now,” she said.

  “Suspended?” He sat back, a smile curving his mouth as if he thought she was pulling his leg. “Like in school?”

  She swallowed. The man heated his office like a sauna. And his amusement would turn to contempt if she explained everything. At first, she tried to couch the facts to present her side of the story, something she hadn’t been good at in court.

  But game playing still wasn’t second nature to her, so she started bluntly. “Have you heard of Griff Butler?”

  “That kid,” he said. “The one who went to trial, but his doctor…”

  He pieced the puzzle together in front of her eyes. As he leaned forward, his good-natured smirk faded. “You’re that doctor?”

  “So I should go?”

  “You’re in trouble because of what that kid said?”

  “I’m being investigated.”

  “And my wife says you were making out with that judge guy at the library fundraiser. Not that we were invited. She just heard.” Mr. Herbert stared in silence, but he didn’t hesitate long. He set her application back on his desk then pushed it toward her with the tip of his finger. “I’m sorry, Miss Keaton. I lose enough business to those fancy new places over in Old Honesty. I can’t afford to hire someone who’s in trouble with the law.”

  “Not the law,” she said.

  “I don’t care where the gossip comes from. Maybe I didn’t know your name, but even I knew about you. My customers are more interested in the daily whispers than I am.”

  “Maybe you’d get new customers who’d come in just to look me over.”

  His smile actually held regret, which was a nice improvement on suspicion. “I hate to make your problems worse.”

  It was only the latest of three similar interviews. Trying to explain further seemed pointless. “Thanks for seeing me.”

  “Hope it works out.”

  “I KNOW YOU,” the stocking manager at the grocery store said. “I can’t believe you’d think I’d hire you.”

  No need to explain this time. “I can’t make much trouble setting canned goods on shelves.”

  “Not here, you won’t be. I’m sorry I don’t have time to be more P.C., but tomorrow’s Thanksgiving. This is one of our busiest days.”

  He crumpled her application and sailed it into a big dirty waste can. Then he looked her up and down. Ah. He’d heard about the fundraiser, too. She might consider the consequences the next time she decided to writhe on a stranger in front of a roomful of people who considered her a harlot.

  This guy might not look like a pervert, but he didn’t mind eyeing her as if he could have her right there on the oversize produce scale.

  “I always heard people like you beat it out of town when they got caught. You’d find a better hunting ground in a different place.”

  Running the bastard down with a shopping cart wouldn’t change his mind about hiring her. She marched into the front of the store, trying to remember she’d once had some dignity.

  She almost skipped her appointment at the Honesty Sentinel. But she’d begged for the time on this Wednesday of all Wednesdays, and they had a delivery route open. According to the ad and the man who’d finally taken her name and assigned her a time to come in, all they needed from her was a car and a valid driver’s license.

  She approached the Sentinel building fighting her fair share of shame and doubt. She couldn’t afford pride. Her savings had begun a disappearing act. The only way out was a job. Or ten.

  She found the newspaper’s personnel office. Filling out the application took mere minutes because they all seemed to be set up the same way, and she’d filled out so many in the past several days.

  “Sit in one of those chairs,” said the assistant who’d handed her the app. “Mrs. Fellner will call you when she’s ready.”

  Maria sat in a beige vinyl chair and waited, her fingers twisting like a nest of snakes. A few minutes later, Mrs. Fellner opened her office door and came out, reading the page her assistant had given her. She took a look at Maria and then went back to the application.

  “You’re older than we usually get.”

  “I’m reliable, too.”

  “You understand this job means early hours? People want to read the news over their morning coffee.”

  “I’ll be here whatever time you want me.”

  “For your route, the papers are dropped at the corner of Oak and Lafayette at four forty-five. Let me see your license.”

  Maria handed it over, even though the assistant had copied it and stapled the copy to the application.

  “Be at Oak and Lafayette in the morning.” Mrs. Fellner passed her license back. “You know tomorrow’s Thanksgiving?”

  Suddenly, she had plenty to be grateful for. “Uh-huh,” she said, too stunned to offer more eloquent thanks.

  “The current delivery boy will show you your route. Stop at Lisa’s desk to finish your paperwork.”

  “Thanks.” Maria offered her hand.

  “Oh, yeah.” Mrs. Fellner, already on the way back to her office, came back. She pushed her glasses up her nose and finally looked Maria in the eye. Maria quaked with a touch of dread. But no. The other woman shook hands. “Good luck. Don’t make anyone call me because his paper’s late.”

  “I’d pull them off the press myself, if I had to.”

  “YOU’LL BE FINE,” Tommy Laycock told her the next morning after he’d tossed a paper into the center of a little Cape Cod’s door.

  “Nobody ever complains about you hitting their houses?” He had a precise arm and aim.

  “Sometimes, the dogs fly out of the doggie doors and chase me down the street.” He patted the tufted console between them. “I don’t have me any cool wheels like this. I have a bike.”

  “I may be looking for one soon.”

  He heehawed with earsplitting spontaneity, but it was a welcome sound. “You’re lucky. We used to have to leave envelopes for payment. Some people even stiffed me once a week with that stupid envelope. Then, about eight months ago, the paper finally started billing them from the office.”

  “So I don’t have to collect money.”

  “Or break any arms.” He flexed his hands, gave his knuckles a quick crack.

  “Why are you quitting, Tommy?” His personality seemed like such a fit.

  “I joined the band and we practice in the morning before school. There’s a girl in my class. She plays the tuba. I’m not saying she looks good in that thing, but when she takes it off…”

  “Never mind.” It was the last conversation she needed to have with a kid. “Thanks for showing me the houses.”

  “You think you’ll remember?”

  “Sure. I wrote them all down.” She dropped him back at Oak and Lafayette.

  “Bye, Dr. Keaton,” he yelled as he unlocked his bike.

  She waved, surprised he knew her name. For a second she was tempted to ask if Tommy knew Griff. Common sense rescued her in time. She didn’t need to know if the kid was all right. He was someone else’s problem now.

  At home, she washed the ink off her hands and fell facefirst onto the sofa, sleeping for the first time in weeks as if she weren’t anxious about her next meal. A paper route didn’t go a long way toward security, but it was a crack in the door.

  Later, as bright sunlight crept across the sky through her family room window, she opened her eyes. And licked her dry lips. She’d slept for hours.

  Coffee. Coffee would start her second try at a morning well. Attempting a lousy whistle, she got busy, putting together her meager Thanksgiving dinner. A chicken breast in the oven. Potatoes, both sweet
and Yukon Gold didn’t cost much. Neither did fresh green beans or bagged dressing mix.

  The phone rang while she was cutting onions and indulging in a good old reluctant cry. She wiped her hands on a towel and grabbed the phone.

  “Hey,” said her sister, Bryony.

  “Huh?”

  “How ya doing?”

  “I’m fine, Bryony. Do you need something?”

  “Need something?” Bryony sounded mystified. “Oh, I get it. You mean, why am I calling?”

  In the privacy of her own home, Maria blushed. “I didn’t mean to—”

  “Nah, don’t worry about it. I’m fine. I’m really doing well. Lots of children’s parties. Clowns are even in demand at adult functions these days, except they usually want me to be my evil incarnation.”

  “I’d have nightmares for a month.”

  “I know, but it’s all good to me. I thought you might be lonely today.”

  “I am, but I couldn’t face—”

  “Mom and me? But we wouldn’t interrogate you. We both know you couldn’t do anything wrong.”

  “I feel bad. I wasn’t nice to you a minute ago.”

  “I don’t get how this all happened, but nobody’s going to believe you’d hurt a kid. They’ll look at your records and talk to your other patients.”

  “Clients.”

  “Whatever. They aren’t going to lie about you.”

  “Some of them are pretty unwell. What if the suggestion that I’d do something wrong gives them an idea that appeals to their illnesses?”

  “You’ll deal. Don’t borrow that trouble.” Bryony took a deep, loud breath. “Let me send you some money.”

  “No.” Never going to happen. She’d beg in the street before she took a handout from her mother or her sister.

  “You’ve helped me before. And Mom. Let me help you.”

  “No. Thanks for offering, Bryony. And for calling. I needed to hear you believed in me.”

  “I always will. I’d better go. I think I smell smoke from the kitchen. Happy Thanksgiving.”

  Her favorite holiday. A day for family—or for lovers, she thought, with memories of Jake dancing in her mind’s eye. Thinking of him only made her feel uncertain. They’d both used his daughter as a barrier to feelings that felt untimely and impossible. It was no way to act about family.

  “I love you, Bryony.”

  “Yeah?” They hadn’t said those words much as children. Maria had tried to change that after she left for college. It still didn’t come easily to Bryony. “I love you, too,” she said. “Keep fighting.”

  “I am.”

  She went back to her dinner with a happier heart. She even turned on the Macy’s parade in time to see Underdog taking to the sky. If a beagle in a cape could be a superhero, she could at least find the power to make a living until she got her career back.

  “I HAVE ENOUGH for both of us, Leila. Please come home for Thanksgiving dinner.” Jake waited, hearing only silence amidst the static on his cell. He’d invited Leila to dinner at regular intervals for over a week. She’d ignored his calls and the cards he’d slipped into her mailbox and inside the screen door of her rented town house.

  Just as he pulled the phone away, she spoke up. “Stop calling me, Dad. I don’t want to talk to you.”

  “It’s a special day. Can’t we call a truce?”

  “No.”

  “I don’t want you to be alone.”

  “I’m with my roommates, my friends. They’re more my family than you and Mom ever were. They don’t keep secrets.”

  “Maybe we were wrong, but I’ll talk to you about anything now.”

  “Has it occurred to you that Maria’s living without any pay? She still has office rent and a house payment and probably malpractice insurance. It’s the end of the month.”

  “I’m sure she has savings, Leila.” He said it so casually because he was so damn concerned he might be wrong.

  “She’s barely in her thirties, and she doesn’t charge nearly what the other therapists in town do. I know.”

  “I didn’t start the investigation, and I can’t try to stop it. Even if I did, I’d make more trouble for her.” Especially after the library dance.

  “Maybe,” his daughter said, considering.

  He allowed himself a silent fist pump. Anytime she didn’t immediately reject every word out of his mouth was a triumph.

  “I still don’t understand why you didn’t talk to me first. Even if you’d wanted me to respect your privacy, you’re covered by my insurance while you’re in college. You could have gone to any doctor.”

  “Dad, you’re a clod. I kept on seeing Maria, not because she was cut-rate, but because she helped me. She’s helped a lot of people, kids I know, too, without doing anything inappropriate. She deserves more support from her clients and from the people who hold the power in this town. She’s only lived here for two years, and I know she’s done a lot of work on her house. How much could she have saved?”

  “What do you want me to do, Leila?”

  “Maybe you should take her that Thanksgiving dinner.”

  She hung up on him before he could answer.

  “Are you kidding?” he asked his dead phone.

  But maybe she made sense. Maybe Leila had just given him an excuse. He hadn’t called Maria since the fundraiser. He’d felt embarrassed. She’d been angry, thinking he was seducing her to get answers to Leila’s problems. True, he’d been grateful to get her help, but he’d touched her because he couldn’t go another second holding her close and not giving in to long-suppressed need.

  As he repacked the dinner he’d bought for himself and Leila, he admitted he wanted to see Maria again. And maybe Leila would give him points when he showed up at her house, covered in giblets, to report Maria had thrown their dinner back in his face.

  After he packed everything inside the warming bag the store had given him, he somehow had cranberry sauce and yeast rolls left over. Instead of trying to work the Rubik’s Cube puzzle of wedging them in, he took a plastic bag and tossed the sauce and bread inside.

  Just before he left, he grabbed a bottle of brandy for his aunt who lived close to Maria. He took her brandy every year for the holidays. She had a heart condition and she could only tipple a little, so she made the bottle stretch.

  In the car, he had to turn on the radio to drown out the warning voices that shouted he might be asking Maria to douse him in gravy. He wouldn’t even blame her if she wreaked a little havoc. He deserved it for making a spectacle of her in front of half the town. Maybe letting her assault him with his store-bought dinner would be penance enough to prove he couldn’t help wanting her.

  He drove past Leila’s town house. So many cars were nosed into the parking lot that the sheriff and all his deputies would be kept busy writing tickets all day. At least she wasn’t alone.

  His aunt Helen wasn’t home when he knocked on her door. Often, she and her cronies met for the holidays. At an age where several had lost spouses, and many of their children had left Honesty for more cosmopolitan pastures, they kept one another company.

  Maybe making sure Maria didn’t spend today alone might not be such a farfetched idea. He left the brandy in Helen’s mailbox with a note then drove down the street to Maria’s little green house.

  Her yard was tidy, her paint fresh. He stared at the windows that looked like made-up eyes with their diaphanous curtains and drapes.

  Her home welcomed him, even if she might not. Two years ago, this house had been a run-down blight in Helen’s neighborhood. After it had been sold, but long before he’d learned Maria was the new owner, he’d driven past this place with growing envy.

  She’d transformed it into a home. Cozy and warm—and probably closed to him.

  He grabbed the dinner stuff from the backseat and headed up the sidewalk, his heart beating like a kid’s on his first date. Not giving himself time to think about right or wrong, he punched the small, glowing doorbell.

  The curta
in nearest the door flickered. Then nothing happened.

  He could ring again, or stand here like a neon “I’m the guy who made a fool of himself with the woman who lives here” sign. As if she saw it that way, too, Maria snatched the door open. She grabbed his bread bag arm and yanked him inside.

  He stumbled into a wide family room, glimpsing scarred wooden floors and a few pieces of expensive chintz, overstuffed furniture.

  “What are you doing here?” Maria asked. “Aren’t people talking about me enough?”

  “I could be a good cover for you.”

  “That’s a hell of a thing to say after the other night—” She broke off as he grinned. “You’re joking.”

  Nodding, he glanced toward the door. “I am. But maybe I should park my car in your garage. Or at my aunt’s down the street.”

  “Helen’s your aunt?”

  The change of subject was almost too easy. He couldn’t have managed it better if he’d done it with a plan. “You know her?”

  “With the dogs?” Helen’s Afghan wolfhounds were more like hooligan teenagers. “I didn’t put your names together,” Maria said. “You ought to walk those dogs for her.”

  “I’ve tried to get her to take them to obedience school. To her, they’re just ‘rowdy, delightful children,’ and she can’t admit the truth even to get help.”

  “They’re a menace. She’s pretty fragile, you know.”

  “I’ve warned her they’ll break her hip one day.”

  “How subtle of you. I can’t imagine why she didn’t take your advice.” Maria looked at the bags. “What’s that?”

  “Dinner.” He sniffed. Hers smelled a lot better than the victuals he’d paid for. “But you don’t need any, do you?”

  “Why would you bring me dinner?” Pale color stained her cheeks. “You don’t think the other night meant anything?”

  He stared at her slightly open, shiny, moist lips. Maybe he could make her take that back.

  “We’ve already established I don’t pretend for the sake of politeness,” he said. “It meant plenty, and you should admit it.”

  “Kissing you was a mistake.”