Last Breath (The Good Daughter 0.5)

“I know that, too.”

“So.” Lenore sat back in her chair. She studied Charlie. “Are we going to talk about how your period is a week late?”

Charlie crammed the cinnamon bun into her mouth so that she didn’t have to answer.

4

Jo and Mark Patterson lived in a newly developed section of town where trailer parks and chicken farms had been replaced by massive five- and six-bedroom houses on three-acre estate lots. This was the sprawliest of urban sprawl, people who were rich enough to live in Atlanta, but successful enough to make the two-hour drive to the city once or twice a month to check in on their investments before heading back to cleaner, easier living in the country. Ben and Charlie often made caustic jokes about the hideous McMansions, but the truth was that they were jealous of the bonus rooms and four-car garages and especially the swimming pools.

The Pattersons only had a three-car garage, which made her feel weirdly sorry for them. From the street, the brick and stucco semi-Tudor style looked crisp and clean, but as Charlie pulled down the long drive, she saw that some of the paint was peeling back from the trim. All of the garage doors were closed. An older-looking BMW was parked in the driveway. Charlie had hoped she’d be early enough to accidentally run into Oliver, Flora Faulkner’s alleged boyfriend, but she gathered from the MY KID IS AN HONOR STUDENT AT PIKEVILLE HIGH SCHOOL bumper sticker that Jo Patterson was a stay-at-home mom.

Charlie checked back through her notebook, because she had already forgotten the Patterson girl’s name.

Nancy.

Charlie found her Dorito-dusted pen. She had put on her list that she needed to talk to Flora’s teachers at school, but she should go ahead and check out Nancy Patterson, too. And she might as well throw Oliver Patterson into the mix. He was likely long-gone from school, but teachers tended to remember bad kids, and Charlie guessed by the fact that Oliver already had a criminal record that he had been memorable in high school.

There was a low rumble of a car engine gurgling from the street as she got out of her Subaru. Charlie watched a stunning, sapphire blue Porsche Boxter roll past the driveway. If she had to guess, she would say the scrawny young man behind the wheel was approximately nineteen years old with a rap sheet as long as Maude Faulkner’s dick. The boy who could only be Oliver Patterson had a shock of bright yellow hair and a flattened nose that had clearly been broken many times over. Oliver saw Charlie and pushed his wrap-around sunglasses up on his head. He narrowed his eyes at her, his lips pursed. He was trying to be a badass, but all she could think was that he looked like a capuchin monkey.

The tires screeched as he hooked a sharp U-turn around the cul-de-sac and sped back the way he had come.

“Okay,” Charlie mumbled, wondering what that show was about. If Oliver Patterson was really Flora’s boyfriend, then the girl needed a lesson about the frying pan and the fire.

She hefted her purse onto her shoulder and turned back toward the house. Up close, the peeling paint gave way to rotted wood and large patches of missing stucco. Some of the bricks were chipped. There were large cracks in the walk as she approached the front door. Weeds sprung up between the gaps. The lawn was patchy, like a dog with mange. The leaves on the boxwoods in front of the porch were curling from some kind of fungus. One of the panes in the bay window was broken; others were fogged up between the double layers of glass. Some shingles had fallen from the roof and landed in the yard. The porch steps were rotted. Even the paint on the front door had faded from red to almost pink.

Charlie had dealt with her share of rich people. Either the Pattersons were from old money and they didn’t know how to take care of things or they were from new money that had run out too quickly.

She remembered what Leroy had said about Oliver being as crooked as his father. Charlie cursed herself for not looking into the family before coming over. Her intrinsic nosiness, her joy of delving into other people’s business, was paramount to her job as a criminal defense lawyer. Normally, she knew more about her clients and potential witnesses than they knew about themselves. Not this time. She didn’t even know how Mark Patterson made a living. Or didn’t, if that turned out to be the case. She was too distracted today, taking too much of what she was being told at face value.

The doorbell was Scotch-taped over, so she knocked four times and waited. Then she knocked again, but harder, thinking a more timid sound would go unheard in the gigantic house.

Charlie watched another car roll by. The neighbor across the street, she assumed, as a brand-new Mercedes pulled into the driveway opposite. A woman got out with her suit jacket over one arm and a briefcase hooked on the other, personifying the clip art of a working mother. She stared openly at Charlie, her nose wrinkled as if she could smell out Charlie’s purpose for being on her neighbor’s front porch.

“Hello?”

Charlie jumped back, almost falling down the steps. The front door was open. A petite, forty-ish woman in black yoga pants and a neon green tank top stood with a water bottle in one hand and a shotgun in the other.

“Shit!” Charlie’s hands went up, though the barrel of the gun was pointed down.

“Oh, sorry. It’s not loaded. At least, I think it’s not loaded.” The woman set the shotgun down beside the door. She wiped her forehead with a towel. She had that slight glisten of rich-people sweat that came from doing Pilates or yoga or some other form of stretchy exercise that took a lot of time and money to learn.

She told Charlie, “I thought you were our neighbor from across the street. I was upstairs working out and saw her car. She’s such a bitch. Knocks on the door every day giving us shit about this or that—like it’s any of her business.” She motioned for Charlie to come in. “You must be the lawyer?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “I’m Jo Patterson. Flora told us you’d be coming over. Such a wonderful young woman. Did you know she sold the most cookies of anyone in the state? Plus, she’s Nancy’s best friend. Those two are like peas in a pod. We just love her to bits. Do you want some iced tea?”

Charlie felt like she needed to shake her head to make the jumble of information settle into a sensible, linear pattern. “No, thank you.”

“Let’s go to the back. Only a matter of time before that bitch knocks on the door.”

Charlie was delighted to follow her to the back, mostly because she’d always wanted to see inside one of these big houses. Jo pulled closed huge, wood-paneled pocket doors as she walked down the hall, mumbling apologies about the mess. In her wildest dreams, Charlie couldn’t imagine having so many rooms, let alone how to decorate them all. Jo Patterson had apparently run into the same problem. There was a den with nothing but two beanbags and an old tube TV with a gaming console underneath. The dining room was absent a table and chairs. The chandelier was listing sideways as if someone had tried to swing from it. Even the powder room showed signs of neglect. The wallpaper had rolled down from the ceiling. Someone had made a half-hearted attempt to tear it off, but that had only made it look worse.

Charlie asked, “How long have you been here?”

“Five, six years?” She shut another door to what had to be an office. There was a metal desk like they gave high school teachers, metal filing cabinets with heavy locks, and boxes and boxes overflowing with papers. “We’re remodeling, but I’ve been saying that for a while now because I simply cannot make a decision. There are too many choices, you know what I mean?”

Charlie would love to make the decisions if it meant a new dishwasher that didn’t flood if you put more than four plates on the bottom rack.

Jo said, “Here we go.” She held out her arms, indicating a large family room and kitchen. Sunlight streamed in from the humongous windows. The vaulted ceiling was at least thirty feet overhead, wooden beams making it somehow feel homey. The back of the house, at least, had been decorated. It was the only part that looked lived in. Deep leather couches. Recliners. A giant flat-panel TV mounted above a stone fireplace. There was an open concept kitchen that made

Charlie’s eyes water with jealousy—not because she was a cook, but because she wanted a kitchen that made people’s eyes water with jealousy.

If they didn’t want to adopt Flora, Charlie would gladly offer herself up as a replacement.

“We’re not lawn people,” Jo said, as if Charlie had asked a question about the muddy back yard. “It’s a thing with the neighborhood, because there’s some kind of bullshit line in the covenants for the home owners’ association about yards and we were, like, ‘So what?’ but apparently you can’t take a crap around this place without getting permission. But, hey, you’re a lawyer, right? Could you help us get them off our backs? All they are is a bunch of whiny bitches with nothing better to do.”

Charlie had to shake her head again to make sense of the request. “I’m not a real estate lawyer, but I can give you the name of one.”

“Nah.” She waved her hand, indicating Charlie should follow her into the kitchen. “They’ll just charge us for it.”

Charlie didn’t point out that she would’ve charged them, too.

“Sweet or unsweet?”

Charlie hadn’t asked for tea, but she wanted a reason to stay in the kitchen so she could ogle the stainless steel appliances. “Unsweet.”

“Flora is amazing. We couldn’t love her more if we tried.” Jo jerked opened the glass door of the Sub-Zero fridge. The glass rattled. She had to muscle the door closed. She told Charlie, “Nancy met Flora on the first day of school, and they got along like a house on fire. Always have. Two peas in a pod.” She found two clean glasses in the Miele dishwasher beside the scratched apron-front sink. “I was really worried when Mark moved us up here from Roswell, but it’s all worked out. He’s a real estate developer. That’s where he’s at now, scouting out some new property for some developers up from Atlanta who want to build an Applebee’s off of the North 40. Applebee’s! Can you imagine? What’s next? An Olive Garden? A Red Lobster? This place’ll be hoppin’!”

Charlie sat down at the bar-top counter. The smooth granite was cold under her palms. An empty wine fridge purred beside her. Her jealousy dialed back a notch. On closer inspection, the kitchen looked too lived in. There were scuff marks on the walls. A chunk of wood was missing from the vent hood. Two of the red knobs on the range were missing.

Jo, oblivious to the silent criticisms, poured the tea. “And then there’s some other folks looking to build a shopping center off that old mill property on 515. You know the one I’m talking about?” She didn’t need encouragement to keep going. “I could totally see a day spa there. I love it up here, but my Lord, it’s been hard on my nails, and I think half the people up here would be in a hell of a lot better mood if they could get a decent massage. But look at me talking about myself. What do you need from me?”

Charlie listened to the unaccustomed silence.

“About Flora?” Jo prompted. “What do you need me to say?”

Charlie took a moment to put her lawyer hat back on. “Flora is seeking emancipation.”