Summer Rental (34 page)

“I don’t know,” Ellis said truthfully. “Maybe you should trust us because we’ve trusted you. We rented you a room, based solely on what you told us, which turned out to be a lie. We know you’re mixed up in something … complicated. And that you’re afraid of your … is he your ex-husband?”

“Not yet,” Madison said grimly.

“What did he do?” Ellis asked. “To make you run the way you did? You don’t strike me as a scaredy-cat.”

“If I tell you, will you just let me alone?” Madison asked. “Not try to meddle in my affairs?”

“I’ll try,” Ellis said. “I can’t speak for Julia—nobody speaks for her. And nobody controls her.”

“My husband…” Madison started. “He’s an accountant, back in Jersey. He handled the books for the insurance company where
I used to work. That’s where we met. He asked me to lunch, I went, and pretty soon, we were living together.”

“And?” Ellis said gently.

“Don was married when I met him,” Madison blurted. “Of course, I didn’t know that, he didn’t bother to tell me he still had a wife and two teenagers. They were separated, and he did get divorced, but he was definitely still married when we started dating.”

“Would you have dated him if you knew he was married?” Ellis asked, raising one eyebrow.

“Hell, no!” Madison said. “But I should have figured it out. There was a lot about Don Shackleford I should have figured out before we moved in together.”

“You told Julia he was into something really bad,” Ellis prompted. “What did you mean by that?”

Madison bit her lip. “He’s a thief and a con man. He’s been stealing from his clients, at least two million just from the insurance company, that I know about. There’s probably more, though.”

“How do you know?” Ellis asked. “I mean, you didn’t have anything to do with it, right?”

“Oh, because of the money, right?” Madison said bitterly. “You just assume I’m a thief too?”

“I don’t know what to think about you,” Ellis said, exasperated. “You keep everything such a freakin’ secret, what am I supposed to think?”

“I may be a lot of things, but I’m not a thief,” Madison said. “Swear to God. The money was Don’s. Or whoever he was stealing it from.”

“So how do you know your husband was stealing?”

“Adam—he’s a friend from work—told me that a team of auditors had been in the office, looking at all the files. They were investigating Don. I didn’t want to believe Adam. He’s always been jealous of Don, he had kind of a crush on me. So I snuck into Don’s office and checked, and Adam was right. Don had all these bogus companies set up, being paid from Prescott accounts.”

“What did you do?” Ellis asked. “Did you confront your husband? Did he bother to deny it?”

Madison’s laugh was mirthless. “You don’t
confront
Don Shackleford. It
was the other way around. He drove up to the office as I was leaving and followed me home. He knew I’d been up to something, and he … made me tell him what I found out.”

“He hurt you?”

“Not in a way that would be visible to anybody else. He grabbed me, threw me up against the wall, and calmly informed me that if I told anybody about my suspicions that he’d kill me and hide the body where nobody would ever think to look.”

Ellis studied Madison’s face. “You think he’s capable of something like that? Murder?”

“I do now,” Madison said soberly. “He’s capable of that and worse.”

“So you ran?”

“I didn’t know what else to do,” Madison said. “I was terrified. I’d begun to understand a little bit about Don—about his coldness, his dishonesty, but I truly didn’t know he was capable of something like that. Not until I saw it with my own eyes. As soon as he drove off, I knew I had to get out.”

“You couldn’t call somebody? A relative?”

Maryn’s voice was colorless. “You wouldn’t understand. I don’t have a lot of family, just my mom and my aunt, and we’re not close. Emotionally or geographically.”

“What about a girlfriend? Somebody from your office?”

“Don made me quit my job right after we got married. And anyway, I wasn’t exactly chummy with the women in my office. Adam was my only friend there. He’s coming here tomorrow. Him I can trust.”

“Like you can’t trust us?”

Maryn shrugged. “Breaking into my room, that was a really shitty thing to do. Friends wouldn’t do something like that.”

“You made it very clear that you didn’t need any friends,” Ellis reminded her. “But you’re right, it really was shitty. At some point, when she starts to really think about it, Julia will realize that too.”

“Doesn’t matter now,” Madison said.

“You still haven’t told me about the money,” Ellis reminded her. “You’ve got to admit, it’s kind of shady, having all that money hidden in your closet.”

“It’s a long story,” Madison said. “Just go, okay? Tell the others they don’t have to worry about me any more.”

“I’d still like to hear it, if you don’t mind,” Ellis said.

“Whatever,” Madison said. She’d stopped folding clothes and was leaning against the wall opposite the bed where Ellis sat.

“After he threatened me, Don just left,” Madison said. “It never would have occurred to him that I might disobey him. Or leave.

“But as soon as he was gone, I knew I was outta there. I threw some clothes and stuff into that,” she said, gesturing towards the duffle bag. “I didn’t have a plan. I mean, I had some money squirreled away.” She laughed again. “My mother used to call that ‘get outta town money’, and how right she was. It came to a little over six thousand dollars. I grabbed that, and on the way out the door, I remembered my computer. My laptop. Don bought us new computers a few months ago. They came with matching cases, too. So I grabbed my laptop and threw it in the back of the car. And I left.”

“And drove until you got to Nags Head,” Ellis said. “What made you come here?”

A ghost of a smile flitted across Madison’s lips. “I told myself it was a coincidence. I was driving south, saw a billboard for Nags Head, and headed in this direction. But on all those long bike rides I’ve been taking, I’ve done some soul-searching. Nags Head was no accident.”

“You’d been here before?”

“As a kid, with my parents. It was the only vacation they ever took me on. We stayed in a little motel, swam in the pool, went on the bumper cars, ate ice cream—all the stuff normal happy families do. I’d saved my allowance, and I bought a little shell-covered jewelry box with
NAGS HEAD
,
NC
, written on the lid; the first thing I ever bought with my own money.”

“I think I had a jewelry box just like that,” Ellis volunteered. “Except mine said
TYBEE ISLAND
,
GA
. I still have it, come to think of it.”

“Mine’s long gone,” Madison said dully. “My parents split up when I was thirteen. We’d been living in Fayetteville, North Carolina. As soon as school was out that year, my mom loaded me in the car and we
moved to New Jersey to live with my Aunt Patsy. We just drove off, with our clothes in some cardboard boxes from the liquor store. Left everything else in the house.”

“Oh Lord,” Ellis said. “What about your dad?”

“He got remarried,” Madison said. “To a woman who’d been my mom’s best friend.”

Ellis looked down at her right hand, at the narrow gold band lined with tiny diamond chips that her father had given her for her thirtieth birthday. It was the last of a long line of gifts her father had given her over the years.

“Did you ever see him again?”

“Who? Oh, my dad? Not much. They moved to Daytona.”

“I’m sorry,” Ellis said.

“It is what it is,” Madison said, practiced at not caring.

Ellis wanted to change the subject. “Your ring. The one you said was an old family piece. I noticed you stopped wearing it.”

“My engagement ring. Don bought it for me, right before we got married. I’m thinking of pawning it. Wanna make me an offer?”

Ellis glanced at Madison’s now-bare hands. “Why do you need to pawn it? With all that money?”

“I’m not touching that money,” Madison said. “I didn’t even know it was there, not until I went to unpack my laptop and realized I’d actually grabbed Don’s by mistake.”

“And the money was in his laptop case? Do you mind if I ask how much?”

Madison shrugged. “Close to a hundred thousand dollars.”

“For real?” Ellis’s eyes widened.

“I’ve got Don’s money. And I know he’s stolen millions more. He probably thinks I meant to take the cash. Now do you see why I was in such a panic when I found out Julia talked to him? What if he finds me?”

“You think he’d hurt you? To get at the money?”

“A few months ago I’d have said no. Now, for sure. With Don, it’s not just about the money. It’s about control. Ownership.”

Ellis looked down at her hands, then out the window, thinking a
bout her own brief marriage, and its sudden, emotionless ending. It had been so painful at the time, but maybe, in comparison to what Madison was going through, Ben’s way was preferable.

“So … you and Don were already having problems before this?” Ellis asked.

“Yeah,” Madison said sourly. “If by problems you mean he was sleeping with somebody else and I’d moved into the guest bedroom.”

“Oh,” Ellis said weakly.

“Don’t know why I was surprised,” Madison said, tossing her head, as though she didn’t really care. “He cheated on his ex-wife with me, why wouldn’t he cheat on me with somebody else?”

“Any idea who she is?”

Madison reached in an open dresser drawer, balled up some shirts, and tossed them at the duffle bag. “I’ve got a very good idea who.”

Now that she’d starting talking to Ellis, it was as though she’d turned on a spigot and was powerless to turn it off. The words just kept spewing.

“Tara Powers! We worked together at the insurance company. We weren’t friends or anything—but she knew Don was married to me.”

Ellis kept thinking about all that money. “A hundred thousand dollars. Do you think he meant to give it to his girlfriend?”

“No way,” Madison said quickly. “Not his style. Don keeps his women on a tight leash.”

“So, what was he doing with all that money?” Ellis persisted.

“I don’t care anymore,” Madison said. “After tomorrow, I’m out of here. I’m only sticking around today because Adam begged me to. He thinks there’s something he can do to get me out of this.”

“Adam? That’s your friend you used to work with?” Ellis asked, her curiosity aroused. “He’s coming here? To Nags Head?”

“He should be about halfway here,” Madison said. “He’s kind of a nerd, but in a really sweet way.”

“You two worked together?”

“Yep. And he’s still there. He’s taking a vacation day to come down here.”

“You told him everything that happened?” Ellis asked, surprised.

“Most of it,” Madison said. “He was on vacation when I took off. I kept trying to text him, but he never got back to me until last night. You won’t believe this—he actually thinks I should go back to Jersey and calmly start divorce proceedings against Don. As if!”

“Let me ask you this,” Ellis said. “You say you’re not going back. What about the insurance company, the one you used to work for, that he ripped off? Don’t you care about any of them?”

“I care!” Madison said. “But I don’t have any proof. Those files I saw at his office? All gone now, I guarantee.”

“What about his laptop? You’ve got that, right? Maybe there are incriminating files on that.”

“I don’t have the password.”

“And you have no idea if the auditors found anything about the embezzlement to tie it to Don, or whether or not the insurance company has brought charges against your husband?”

“No,” Madison said. “I rode my bike over to the library, thinking I could get online on their computers, see if there’s been anything in the news up there,” Madison admitted. “But they won’t let you use the Internet unless you’ve got a library card. And I wasn’t about to apply for one and start giving out personal information.”

“Hmm,” Ellis said, looking out the window. She could just see the edge of the deck of Ty’s garage apartment. She could access the Internet with her iPhone, but she had an ulterior motive—seeing Ty.

“I know somebody who’s got Internet access,” Ellis said. “And I think maybe he’d be willing to let us use his computer, too. That is, if you want our help.”

Madison hesitated. “No, never mind.”

“Suit yourself,” Ellis said, shaking her head. “I did my best, but you really just don’t let anybody get close, do you?”

She got off the bed and went to the door. “I’ll tell the girls … what? You’re leaving tomorrow, or the day after, when your friend gets here? Dorie will be sad. She really thought she could reach out to you.”

Madison let her get down the hallway before she called after her.

“Ellis?”

She turned and walked back, poking her head inside Madison’s bedroom.

“What the hell,” Madison said. “I’ve been wondering what that garage apartment looked like inside.”

“Me too,” Ellis said.

35

Ellis came flying down the stairway, with Madison trailing reluctantly behind. Julia and Dorie sat at the table in the dining room, pretending to play cards.

“We’re going over to Ty’s, to look up some stuff on the Internet,” Ellis started.

“We know,” Julia interrupted.

“What?” Madison said, stopping short, her eyes narrowed. “You bugged my room while you were ransacking it?”

“Sorry,” Dorie said meekly. “We really didn’t mean to eavesdrop. We were up in my room, and as it turns out, the airshaft from Madison’s room runs right through my closet. We kinda heard everything you guys were saying.”

*   *   *

Ty answered the door before they could knock. His hair was still wet from the shower, and he was dressed in khaki cargo shorts and the black Cadillac Jack’s T-shirt.

“Hey!” he said, his face lighting up when he saw Ellis. He leaned forward and kissed her cheek lightly, as though they’d been doing this forever.

“You’re Madison, right?” he said, holding out his hand. “The new girl. Nice to meet you.”

“And you,” she said stiffly.

Still swooning from the scent of Ty’s soap and shampoo, Ellis blushed happily. “Are you on your way out?”