Calamity Jena (Invertary 4)

Nausea assaulted her at his words. At least she was in the right place if she wanted to vomit.

“Jena. Talk. Now. Why do you think your fiancé is going to harm you?”

She sat up straight. “Fiancé? What fiancé?”

He let out an exasperated sigh. “Frank Di Marco.”

Jena shot to her feet and pointed at the door. “He is not my fiancé. He’s a cheating man-whore, that’s what he is. He’s never even proposed. Not that I would have accepted. But there has to be a proposal for there to be a fiancé.”

“Okay, so he isn’t your fiancé. Why would he say he is?”

“Insanity?” She was pretty sure that was the underlying reason for everything Frank did.

“Tell me what’s going on or I can’t help you.” A vision of Officer Donaldson’s deep blue eyes looking all earnest and stern flashed in her mind. She wavered.

“Can you have him kicked out of town? Maybe deported?” She tried not to sound too hopeful.

“Possibly. If I know the truth.”

Jena bit her bottom lip as she shuffled foot to foot.

“It will be okay.” The cop’s soothing brogue almost undid her. “Tell me what the problem is. Trust me, Jena.”

Jena felt herself cave. She took a shaky breath, grateful she was telling her stupid story from behind a door where she couldn’t see the judgment in his eyes. “Frank and I lived together for a while. He cheated on me with a series of strippers. I’m pretty sure they were all called Candy.” She couldn’t keep the snide tone out of her words, which made her feel ashamed. She was better than that. She was better than Frank Di Marco. “Anyway, when I found out about the strippers, I lost the plot a little. I kicked Frank out of the house, sold everything we owned and used the money to move here.”

She took a deep breath while waiting for his reaction.

“Okay, so far I’m not hearing anything that has me worried. I don’t see why the man would come all this way to get revenge over you selling his stuff.”

She bit her bottom lip. “I also sold his perfectly restored 1966 Chevrolet Chevelle. He loved that car more than anything. Definitely more than me.”

There was a pause. “You sold the man’s classic car?”

Jena frowned at the door. “Should I have hit it with a baseball bat and set fire to the seats instead?”

“Point made. Carry on.”

Jena rolled her eyes. Men and their cars. “That’s all there is to tell. Once everything was gone, I surfed the net looking for a new place to live. I remembered my mom talking about Invertary—she’s a huge Josh McInnes fan and gives me updates on what he’s doing. Next thing I knew, I was looking at the town website. Then the town’s real estate site. After drowning my sorrow in a bottle of tequila, I bought a house.” She paused. “And here I am.”

There was silence for a minute. If it wasn’t for the sound of his breathing, she would have thought he’d left her.

“Let me get this right. You sold everything the guy owned, without his knowledge, and bought a house in Scotland with the proceeds?”

She felt her cheeks burn. “I had a holiday in Paris too. But bear in mind that he isn’t really a guy. He’s a scum-sucking man-whore.”

For a moment she heard nothing, and then deep laughter echoed throughout the room.

“Remind me never to piss you off,” the cop said between gasps.

Jena frowned at the closed door, wondering what the correct response was to that statement.

“Am I going to be arrested for selling his stuff?” It had been worrying her.

“You didn’t do it in Scotland, Jena.”

“Will they extradite me?”

The cop started laughing again. “I only talked to Frank for a couple of minutes, but I figure the cops in Atlantic City will give you a standing ovation rather than charge you with theft. I don’t know much about American law, but in Scotland if you live with someone for a couple of years you’re considered to be in a common-law marriage and your property is shared. Over here the stuff you sold would have legally belonged to you too.”