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Authors: Maggie Barbieri
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doing there. Because that was a man who, in a five-minute interlude, had managed to pique her curiosity, something no one had been able to do in a very long time.
Maybe ever.
CHAPTER 8
Kids’ birthday parties were the worst.
Maeve had to remind herself several times during a party why she had started this part of the business. Oh, that’s right—seventy-five dollars a head with a minimum of ten kids. Throwing just two parties a month paid her rent and kept her going. Otherwise, it was muffin by muffin, scone by scone, as Cal so wisely pointed out, and even with the free help her two teenage daughters occasionally provided, it was tough going. She had her one paid employee, but Jo preferred to work the “front of the house,” as she liked to call it, passing up the opportunity to spend an afternoon with icing-covered kids.
After she’d hosted just a few, word had gotten out that a birthday party at The Comfort Zone was worth every penny, and soon Maeve was booking back-to-back parties every weekend.
Too bad she hated kids, her own notwithstanding, although even they made her question her devotion to them from time to time.
Before the party, she had visited her father again at Buena del Sol. She reminded him that he couldn’t leave the premises without her, even if it was just to go across the street to the deli to get a six-pack.
He responded by reminding her that he was sixty-eight years of age and that he didn’t have to listen to anyone. He was a grown man.
Once again, she didn’t have the heart to tell him that he was really eighty and that he did have to listen to her. And while he was a grown man, he was one whose brain didn’t fire on all cylinders. That conversation was like a broken record, and it didn’t matter how many times she told him; it only made her feel better for a short time and made him more determined to grab hold of his freedom. She had enough on her plate without tracking down another facility that wouldn’t just sedate him, strap him in a wheelchair, and wait for him to die. She kept all that to herself, though, extracting a promise from him—probably already forgotten—that he would stay put.
Once, he had been a detective from whom other detectives sought advice; he had spent thirty years on the police force, working far longer than he had to to collect a significant pension. It was the work that he loved and that kept him at it. Some days, he would regale her with stories that she had never heard, and she was still surprised to find that she was fascinated; she thought she had heard them all. His gift had been his gab, as he liked to say, Jack Conlon being the guy who was called when all else failed, when even the right series of questions in an interrogation didn’t elicit the right answer in a given situation. He could find common ground with anyone, and that made him trustworthy to even the crustiest of criminals.
He wasn’t a shadow of his former self; there were still flashes of that great sense of humor, and physically the old guy could probably take out men half his age. She wondered, though, how long it would be until he forgot her completely, looking at her as if she were the greatest mystery he had yet to solve.
Going from her visit with Jack straight to the party had been a bad idea. It was hard to be festive for a bunch of little kids when all she could think of was the next time he was found on the side of the road by a passerby or a cop, a newspaper tucked under his arm, a six-pack swinging back and forth as he made his way to a destination he wasn’t entirely sure of. Home? If asked, he would have no idea where that was.
She had a hard time getting her daughters to work the parties anymore, so today she was on her own; the girls had their limits, apparently. There were only nine girls for this party and they were fairly well behaved, the birthday girl’s parents’ bickering not an indication of the kids’ demeanors. One of the invited children
Maybe ever.
CHAPTER 8
Kids’ birthday parties were the worst.
Maeve had to remind herself several times during a party why she had started this part of the business. Oh, that’s right—seventy-five dollars a head with a minimum of ten kids. Throwing just two parties a month paid her rent and kept her going. Otherwise, it was muffin by muffin, scone by scone, as Cal so wisely pointed out, and even with the free help her two teenage daughters occasionally provided, it was tough going. She had her one paid employee, but Jo preferred to work the “front of the house,” as she liked to call it, passing up the opportunity to spend an afternoon with icing-covered kids.
After she’d hosted just a few, word had gotten out that a birthday party at The Comfort Zone was worth every penny, and soon Maeve was booking back-to-back parties every weekend.
Too bad she hated kids, her own notwithstanding, although even they made her question her devotion to them from time to time.
Before the party, she had visited her father again at Buena del Sol. She reminded him that he couldn’t leave the premises without her, even if it was just to go across the street to the deli to get a six-pack.
He responded by reminding her that he was sixty-eight years of age and that he didn’t have to listen to anyone. He was a grown man.
Once again, she didn’t have the heart to tell him that he was really eighty and that he did have to listen to her. And while he was a grown man, he was one whose brain didn’t fire on all cylinders. That conversation was like a broken record, and it didn’t matter how many times she told him; it only made her feel better for a short time and made him more determined to grab hold of his freedom. She had enough on her plate without tracking down another facility that wouldn’t just sedate him, strap him in a wheelchair, and wait for him to die. She kept all that to herself, though, extracting a promise from him—probably already forgotten—that he would stay put.
Once, he had been a detective from whom other detectives sought advice; he had spent thirty years on the police force, working far longer than he had to to collect a significant pension. It was the work that he loved and that kept him at it. Some days, he would regale her with stories that she had never heard, and she was still surprised to find that she was fascinated; she thought she had heard them all. His gift had been his gab, as he liked to say, Jack Conlon being the guy who was called when all else failed, when even the right series of questions in an interrogation didn’t elicit the right answer in a given situation. He could find common ground with anyone, and that made him trustworthy to even the crustiest of criminals.
He wasn’t a shadow of his former self; there were still flashes of that great sense of humor, and physically the old guy could probably take out men half his age. She wondered, though, how long it would be until he forgot her completely, looking at her as if she were the greatest mystery he had yet to solve.
Going from her visit with Jack straight to the party had been a bad idea. It was hard to be festive for a bunch of little kids when all she could think of was the next time he was found on the side of the road by a passerby or a cop, a newspaper tucked under his arm, a six-pack swinging back and forth as he made his way to a destination he wasn’t entirely sure of. Home? If asked, he would have no idea where that was.
She had a hard time getting her daughters to work the parties anymore, so today she was on her own; the girls had their limits, apparently. There were only nine girls for this party and they were fairly well behaved, the birthday girl’s parents’ bickering not an indication of the kids’ demeanors. One of the invited children
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