I Want Candy by Susan Donovan Page A

Eighteen months ago, she was dining at Florida’s finest restaurants, drinking exotic cocktails at the best Miami Beach clubs, partying at private estates from Ocala to Key West. And now she was back in Bigler, an itinerant unemployable person, lucky to have food and shelter of any kind. And she was bitching about the cake at her mother’s retirement home?
    She needed to get a grip.
    “Thank you, Gerrall. I’ll just stick this in the fridge.”
    “Oh, that reminds me,” Jacinta said. “Any leftover food goes in a Tupperware container. No exceptions. It’s part of the bylaws.”
    “Got it.”
    Candy took a moment to check out Jacinta’s tiny but chic kitchenette, noting the quality tile, countertops, and cabinetry. Then she poked her head into the bathroom, where she found the same attention to detail. Her mother’s bedroom was large, featured two walk-in closets and a built-in window seat. She estimated that the apartment had to be close to a thousand square feet.
    Yep. This place was expensive. Candy swallowed hard at the prospect of telling Jacinta that she’d squandered the sixty thousand her mother had given her to invest in real estate.
    “I’ll catch you later then,” Gerrall said, waving good-bye to Candy as Jacinta shoved him out the door.
    “Little pecker-head,” her mother mumbled under her breath.
    “He seems nice enough,” Candy said, revising her original opinion of the guy as she came back to the sitting room.
    “He doesn’t come from good people, Candace. Keep an eye on him. Do not trust him. And that goes double for Miller.” Jacinta pointed to the sofa again. “We might as well get down to business. Have a seat. I want to know how it is that my big-shot daughter has shown up on my doorstep without a dime to her name.”
    “Uh, well…”
    “Your daddy always said you’d shoot yourself in the foot.” Jacinta settled into her chair once more, spreading her caftan in an arc around her. “Thank God he’s not alive to see this. That man was insufferable when he turned out to be right.”
    *   *   *
     
    “Why the hell didn’t you say anything?” Cheri’s voice was sharper and louder than usual. It was so loud, in fact, that Candy feared Jacinta could hear her best friend’s phone voice all the way through the closed bedroom door.
    “I’m sorry if you’re mad ’cause I left Viv’s,” Candy whispered. “I appreciate you getting her to let me stay for a while, but I just couldn’t stand it.”
    Cheri made a hissing sound of impatience. “Oh, Lord, Candy. I don’t blame you one bit for leaving—she told me you two had a run-in when you got home last night. I’m talking about Turner ! Why didn’t you tell me about what happened with Turner when he pulled you over yesterday?”
    “Oh.” Candy sat up on the couch, slipped into her flip-flops, and tiptoed across her mother’s sitting room to the door. “Hold on a sec.” As silently as possible, she unlocked the dead bolt and crept into the hallway. It was nine-fifteen and the place was silent as a tomb. “Yeah, about that,” she said, leaning against the wall and sliding down until her butt hit the carpet. “It’s kind of a weird story, actually.”
    “Where are you?”
    “At Jacinta’s place,” she whispered. “Believe it or not.”
    “Not,” Cheri said. “But I’ll get to that in a minute—why are you whispering?”
    “Because she said ‘no late-night phone calls’ and I’m sitting out in the hallway.”
    Cheri paused. “It’s nine-fifteen.”
    “Around here, that’s the middle of the freakin’ night.”
    “Right. So what did she say about the nest egg?”
    Candy gulped, not looking forward to sharing the details of that unpleasant conversation, even with Cheri. She wasn’t entirely sure which part was more painful—the part where her mother told her she never expected to get the money back in the first place or the part where she accused Candy of being incapable of staying put long