The Best Next Thing

“Thank you for bringing our Charity back to us.” The words were spoken by the tall, blonde older woman, whom Miles hadn’t noticed standing beside him. He recognized her, of course. She had been the author of many of the Facebook posts on Blaine Davenport’s memorial page.

He didn’t respond to the woman’s words but waited to see what she would do next.

“She’s my daughter-in-law, you know? She was devastated when our Blaine died. Absolutely devastated. She was in a depression for so long, we feared we would lose her too. Feared she would follow him…you know? Because she couldn’t stand to live without him.” Something told Miles that that was what she had expected of Charity. For her to follow Blaine.

Fuck that.

“Charity would never do something so utterly weak and cowardly,” he dismissed caustically. And watched in satisfaction, as the shot scored a direct hit. Blaine the Arsehole may not be with them any longer, but this woman had been complicit in his abuse of Charity, and Miles wasn’t above taking potshots at her.

The woman’s expression went frigid, all pretense of civility evaporating in the face of Miles’s opening salvo.

“My son was a strong, proud, and honorable man. He adored his wife and she adored him.”

“Bullshit, you knew exactly what a monster your son was. You raised him to be that way.”

She gasped, an affronted hand going up to her chest.

“I don’t know what Charity has told you…but I can assure you it’s false. Blaine always loved her so much.”

“Yeah, I like to burn the women I love too,” Miles replied, with a cynical snort. “And cut them and hurt them and humiliate them.”

“You don’t know anything.” Her voice was an angry sibilant whisper, and she bristled with fury. “Charity was always difficult. I warned him not to marry her, warned him she would make a terrible pastor’s wife, but he loved that girl beyond reason. She tested him. Tested his commitment to his faith and his parish. What was he supposed to do?”

“Not fucking hit her! Not mark her with cigarettes, or slice her with razor blades. Not break her ribs. He was supposed to love her for the amazing, spirited, beautiful woman she is.”

“Yes, their relationship was very volatile, but there was always love there.”

Her eyes shone with tears, and for a second, Miles felt sorry for her, for the mother who had lost her only child. Then he recalled Charity mentioning the times the very woman standing before him had driven Charity to hospital after one of her precious son’s more violent beatings. How she had made Charity feel at fault. She had been as abusive as her son and Miles refused to waste another moment of sympathy on her.

He glanced over at Charity, then froze, she had climbed off the trampoline and was staring at them in concern.

Shit.

He was one-hundred-percent certain she wouldn’t be pleased to know what they were discussing. He swallowed down the rest of what he wanted to say and smiled frigidly instead.

“If you’ll excuse me,” he said, with insincere politeness. “I see someone over there I’d much rather be spending time with.”

He shoved his hands into his trouser pockets and, without waiting for a response, walked away.

“What did you tell that horrid, horrid man about my son?” Sandra cornered Charity in the ladies’ room about forty-five minutes after Charity had seen her speaking with Miles. It had been very apparent from the woman’s offended body language during that conversation that whatever Miles had been saying had not been to her liking.

Charity had an inkling of course, but she hadn’t been able to pin him down to ask for specifics. Not when everybody wanted to speak with her and spend time with her.

Charity wasn’t even sure how she felt about Miles talking to Sandra about Blaine. Angry? Upset? Hurt? Concerned? Relieved? It was all jumbled up and left her even more confused and frustrated than before.

Now her former mother-in-law had a hand clamped around Charity’s wrist and looked utterly furious with her. Sandra’s hand tightened when she caught sight of Charity’s bare ring finger. She had stopped wearing the fake ring the day after she and Miles first made love.

“Where is your wedding ring? Why aren’t you wearing it? It’s a family heirloom. I want it back if you no longer intend to wear it.”

In the past, Charity may have been cowed by the older woman’s strong-arm tactics. Back when they had isolated her from her family, this woman had been the only maternal figure in her life, and Charity had been grateful to her for always taking care of her in the aftermath of Blaine’s brutal attacks. She had long since recognized it for the carrot-and-stick routine that it had been. And Sandra Davenport no longer held any sway over her.

She yanked her wrist out of the woman’s grip and glared right back.