LITMIR.BIZ

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he told the group. “We have a special guest joining us tonight, a friend of Mack’s from his college days.” He pointed out each person at the table. “Lisa, Belinda, John, and Tanya, this is Charlotte LaRue. Please make her feel welcomed.”

      All eyes turned toward Charlotte, and though she smiled, she felt her face grow warm with embarrassment.

      Again, Belinda smiled at her, and again, Lisa simply glared at her, but the man named John and the woman named Tanya gave her a friendly acknowledging nod as Mack nudged her toward the other end of the table.

      “I believe these two places are for us,” Mack said.

      Once they were seated, a waiter appeared to take their drink order.

      “Unsweetened tea,” Charlotte told him.

      “A Bloody Mary for me,” Mack said. Then he turned to Charlotte. “So, have you worked for the hotel long?”

      “No, I haven’t. I’m just filling in temporarily as a favor for an old friend. Actually, I run my own cleaning service, Maid-for-a-Day.”

      When a puzzled frown crossed Mack’s face, Charlotte explained. “I employ two full-time maids and one part-time. We specialize in clients who live in the Garden District.”

      Mack shook his head in amazement. “How in the devil did you end up being a maid? Not that there’s anything wrong with being a maid,” he hastened to add. “It’s just that with your brains, I always figured that you’d end up a college professor or something.”

      Coming from anyone else Charlotte would have been highly offended by Mack’s assumption that only people of low intellect would choose to be a maid. “I never finished my degree,” she told him bluntly. “I was finishing up my junior year when my parents were both killed in an accident—”

      “I had no idea,” Mack interrupted, his expression full of sympathy. “That’s terrible.”

      Charlotte nodded. “Yes, at the time it was terrible. My father had never been able to afford life insurance, and their deaths left me with not only the welfare of my young son to think about, but also my younger sister to support. Thanks to Professor McGee—you remember her, don’t you? She was an English Professor at Tulane.” When Mack nodded, she continued. “Anyway, she was the one who suggested that I could make quite a bit of money cleaning houses, and she even recommended me to several of her more wealthy friends.” Charlotte smiled. “Turned out she was right. And the rest is, as they say, history.”

      From the expression on Mack’s face, Charlotte could already see questions forming. Still not comfortable talking to him about how she ended up with a fatherless son, she decided a subject change was in order. In her experience, asking the other person questions was the best way to change the subject. “So, what about you, Mack? How did you end up being an accountant?”

      At that moment, the waiter returned with their salads. No sooner had he placed Charlotte’s salad in front of her than a woman rushed through the door. Charlotte immediately recognized her as the same woman who had received a phone call from Tessa. Charlotte frowned, racking her brain for the woman’s name. Maybe Margaret. Yes, Margaret was her name.

      “So sorry I’m late,” Margaret gushed as she seated herself next to Belinda.

      Frank nodded then cleared his throat. “Ah, excuse me.” All eyes turned to him. “I believe most of you already know Margaret, my secretary and my right-hand man, so-to-speak. Of course rumor has it that she’s really the one running the company.”

      As expected, everyone laughed at Frank’s little joke, and a flush of embarrassment stole up Margaret’s cheeks. When the laughter died down, Frank motioned toward the other end of the table where Charlotte and Mack were seated. “Margaret, meet Charlotte. She and Mack are old friends.”

      A spark of recognition lit Margaret’s eyes as she and Charlotte nodded and smiled to each other. Then, Margaret turned to Frank. “Just so you know, I was able to finish typing that document you need for tomorrow’s meeting.”

      Frank laughed. “That’s my girl. Hey, everybody,” he said, still laughing, “not only does she run the firm, but she’s got the fastest fingers in the south.”

      Again, as if on cue, everyone laughed, but this time the laughter seemed even more forced than before, and it was all that Charlotte could do to keep from rolling her eyes.

      Oh, brother. If this stuff gets much deeper, I’m going to need hip boots.

      Appalled at her thoughts, Charlotte tucked her head and forked up a mouthful of salad. Thankfully, everyone else followed suit, then slowly, once again the murmur of conversation filled the room.

      Afraid that Mack would resume giving her the third degree, Charlotte swallowed the bite of salad, then said, “Now, where were we? Oh, yeah, you were going to tell me how you ended up being an accountant.”

      Mack smiled. “After Nam, I finished up my degree and was working towards becoming a CPA when I met Joanne, Tessa’s mother. Tessa was just a little girl at the time, and Joanne was struggling to hold on to the money that she’d inherited from her father. Joanne’s first husband had turned out to be a drunk and had just about spent her inheritance before she realized what was happening. She’d already divorced him when we met, and—like I said—was struggling to hold on to what money she had left. Anyway, Joanne hired me to look after her investments. One thing led to another, we got married, then, together we worked until her finances were back on solid ground. Just as everything was looking up, Joanne discovered that she had breast cancer. Six months later she died.”

      His face bleak with sorrow, Mack paused and for several moments a muscle in his jaw quivered.

      Remembering her own pain after Hank and her parents were killed, Charlotte could truly sympathize. “That had to be a painful time for you,” she said softly.

      Mack sighed then nodded. “Yes it was. Joanne was a wonderful woman, and I still miss her. But then you know all about that kind of pain, don’t you?”

      “Yes, I do,” she said, realizing how much in common they had with each other. “But whether we like it or not, life does go on.”

      “I guess.” Mack cleared his throat. “Anyway, when Joanne died, Tessa was a young teenager, and since she had no one else, I finished raising her.”

      “What happened to her father?”

      Mack shrugged. “He was a loser. For Tessa’s sake, I tried to locate him after Joanne died. It took several years to track him down, and when I finally found him, he was in prison. There was no way I could bring myself to tell Tessa that her father was a jailbird, so, like I said, I raised her.”

      “Raising a teenager by yourself had to be hard.”

      Mack simply shook his head. “Hard doesn’t begin to describe it. As a child Tessa had a stubborn streak, not to mention that Joanne and I had both spoiled her. After her mother’s death, she was even worse—staying out to all hours of the night and constantly in trouble at school. Once, she even ran away, and for months I didn’t know where she was or even if she was dead or alive. Then one day, out of the blue, she showed up at the front door. I don’t know what happened to her during that time—and she’s never told me—but whatever happened totally changed her. She went back to school, graduated with honors, and even went on to get a college degree. I’ll tell you one thing, the day she graduated from college was one of the proudest days of my life.”

      At that moment two waiters showed up. While one of the waiters whisked away the salad plates, the other one served the entrées.

      Immediately recognizing the dish, Charlotte’s mouth watered: pecan-crusted catfish with Creole meuniére sauce. “I think I just died and went to heaven,” she murmured.

      Mack glanced her way quizzically. “Pardon?”

      Realizing that she’d actually spoken her thoughts, Charlotte laughed. “Don’t mind me. Just thinking out loud.”

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