9. Charlie
CHAPTER 9
Charlie
After we leave the diner, we drive one street over to a line of old houses with large yards and picket fences. It looks like something from a magazine. Max parks the truck in front of an old two-story house with a two-car garage attached to it.
“Why are we in someone’s yard?”
Max explains to me, “We’re at Darlene’s.”
“Yes, you keep saying that.” I press a thumb to the middle of my forehead. “I don’t know if you know this or not, but I’m from out of town, and I don’t know Darlene.”
“Well, if you stay in town long enough, you’ll know Darlene, because Darlene knows everybody,” he explains very slowly as he adjusts his ball cap. “I’ll be right back.”
“You realize that’s not very helpful, right?” I call after him as he climbs out of the truck and heads up the driveway to the house. I assume I’m supposed to wait in the truck, so that’s where I stay.
But then the front door opens, and a woman in her forties with long brown hair steps out. She greets Max, waves to me, then jabs at Max’s arm. I can’t understand what they’re saying with the car door closed, but I see Max’s shoulders sag. He turns back to the truck and waves me to join them. That’s weird. I point to myself as if he could be pointing to another option in the car.
He frowns and mutters something—probably not nice. I can practically hear him all the way over here. He motions again for me to join them on the porch. I unbuckle and climb out of the truck because, really, I just want to meet Darlene. She seems to be the person to know.
“I can’t believe he was gonna leave you in the truck,” Darlene greets me as I climb the steep steps to the covered porch. She has brown hair and bangs and a face with smile lines and twinkling eyes.
I’m tempted to say something that will throw Max under the bus, but he didn’t actually leave me in the truck—I stayed there. “I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to get out or not,” I tell her.
“Oh, that’s okay, honey. It always takes me a little while to pull all the orders, especially when people don’t give me a heads up that they’re coming.” She turns to give Max a chiding look.
She turns back to me and shakes my hand. “I’m Darlene.”
“I’m Charlie Baxter.”
“You come on in, Charlie. I don’t want you to freeze in the truck.” She flicks Max’s arm when she walks by, and he grins at her. “Max should have called ahead that you were on your way, and I would have had everything ready.”
Max doesn’t even look like he feels bad. “You know cell service is bad out there,” he tells her.
Darlene laughs. “I know you’re only doing this to see what I’ve baked for the day.”
We step into her entryway, which has a nice large rug and a big shelf lined with shoes and boots.
I jump a little when Max leans close to me to rest a hand against the wall as he kicks off his boots. “You’re about to see why I like to surprise Darlene. She feeds me,” he whispers loudly.
Darlene laughs. “I heard that!”
He looks happy. Less raging grump. And he looks like he’s actually got a soul rather than being the heartless Scrooge I’ve come to know and hate.
I force my eyes away from his face because that’s just dangerous territory right now. Smiling Max is a dangerous Max.
Darlene motions for us to follow her farther into the house. “Well, you might as well wait in the kitchen. I’m going to go put together Max’s order. There are some pumpkin muffins on the table, and the coffee pot is warm. You better plan on staying a little while, because I’ve never met one of Max’s girlfriends.”
She disappears down the hall, and I don’t have the chance to tell her that I’m not his girlfriend.
I hear the door close after her.
“One of your girlfriends? How many do you have?” I mutter as I follow him into the kitchen. Max actually blushes, and I can’t help but think about how that, combined with his smile, would be an adorable combination.
“I do not have lots of girlfriends.”
“I know,” I say and give him a sad look.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asks as he pulls out a chair at the round kitchen table and sinks into it. It creaks but holds up well for looking like it’s a thousand years old.
“Well, the way you like to throw women out of the house…it’s not a surprise they don’t stick around.”
Max snorts. “Why am I having this conversation with you?”
I raise my eyebrows. “We’re in a stranger’s house, who just assumed I am your girlfriend. That seems to make sense on why we’re talking about it.”
He picks up a muffin and holds it in front of my face.
“You can’t distract me with delicious muffins,” I tell him as I take a long sniff. They smell…pleasant. Maybe I should try a small bite. I take the muffin from Max and sink my teeth into it. It is delicious.
No wonder he doesn’t call ahead to have Darlene pull his order. If I got to hang out in a waiting room like this all the time, I’d never call ahead either.
We sit there and eat muffins in silence until Darlene returns. She’s carrying a large box that she sets in the center of the table.
“This is all of it, I think. Wait, did you get the mineral bags?” she asks as she pulls a paper from her back pocket.
“I thought I ordered a pallet of those.”
“They were delayed, of course. But they’ll be here either tomorrow or the day after. They’re coming with the shipment of protein tubs.”
Darlene slaps the paper on top of the box. “There’s your invoice. Now let’s get down to business.”
Max looks at me with wide eyes. “Actually, Charlie needs to go. We’re on a tight schedule.” He jumps up, the chair scraping loudly as he leans over to pick up the box, jerking his head toward the door.
“How long have you two been dating?” Darlene asks as she sinks down into the chair next to mine.
“Oh, we’re not dating,” I tell her as I finish the last bite of muffin.
Darlene’s eyebrows shoot up. “Cousins?”
She says it in a way that says the only reason I’m not dating him is that I am related to him.
Max groans, sets down the box, and sinks into the high-backed wooden chair. He looks resigned, but I see the twinkle in his eye right before he says, “Charlie’s boyfriend broke up with her.”
I kick his ankle under the table, and he just grins at me. My socked foot does nothing besides give me a little bruise.
Darlene’s eyes widen, then she pats my knee. “Let me get us some coffee.”
It’s almost like she had the mugs in her back pocket. I’ve never seen anyone prepare three cups so fast, and soon, we’re all sitting around the table, sipping coffee as Darlene waits for an explanation.
“How do you know Max, and why did your boyfriend break up with you?” She hugs the mug as she crosses one leg over the other.
I turn to glare at Max. He shrugs. “You said you didn’t care if I told.”
“I’m going to murder you,” I whisper to him before I turn back to Darlene. “I’m just in town to fix the Whitlocks’ house. It sounds like when some of the family was squatting there, they went out of their way to trash the place.”
“I heard about that. I can’t believe that happened. But someone really should be living in that place year-round. It would help keep it up.” She sets her coffee cup down with a thump. “I always think it’s a shame when places sit empty.”
“But I thought Max lived there.” I turn to stare at him, but he has leaned his head back against the chair, and his baseball cap is pulled low over his face. I think he’s actually sleeping. I didn’t know someone could fall asleep so fast.
Darlene stares back and forth between me and Max’s sleeping figure. “Oh, so you’re really not his girlfriend. Darn. I guess that explains it.”
“Explains what? And he already said I wasn’t his girlfriend.”
Darlene shrugs. “I thought maybe he was joking about your boyfriend breaking up with you. He’s never brought any of his girlfriends around—or any girl, for that matter—and so I assumed maybe you were serious with him, but if you’re just friends…or working together…or staying together…” she keeps adding on with a questioning tone on the end of each phrase.
I just smile because I love small-town politics and rumor mills because nothing travels faster, especially in a ranching community. They put gossip magazines to shame. There’s not much that can compete with the farmer-rancher grapevine. I’m assuming Darlene is one of those if she’s supplying medicine and feed.
“What exactly do you do?” I ask her.
She laughs at that. “I run a little feed store out of my garage. Anybody needs something, I order it.”
Just as I suspected. A drug dealer.
“I try to keep some of the basics in stock, but usually Max and the other ranchers have to put in an order for the vaccines they need ahead of time. Why did your boyfriend break up with you?”She switches the subject without taking a breath.
I glance at a sleeping Max, hoping he’s not listening. “We didn’t click.”
Darlene studies me with a rather focused sense of attention but picks up on the very strong hint that I do not want to be talking about this—especially not with Max here. She leans forward. “So what exactly do you have to do on the lodge?”
“Not too much,” Max pipes up.
I glare at him. His eyes are still closed, but apparently, he wasn’t sleeping. He was just trying to get out of the conversation, and somehow that doesn’t surprise me with the little bit I know about him, so I ignore him and answer Darlene.
“I’ve been ripping into the bathrooms. It’s hard to tell just yet. Maybe some of the plumbing. I can’t tell if it was damaged from the house’s age or a freezing pipes. Probably be a little bit of a roofing project and refinishing a bathroom because who knows what happened to that thing—I’m scared to ask,” I tell her with a laugh.
“So do you do finish work, then?”
“I’m a general contractor, so I do a little bit of everything—except electrical. I don’t mess around with that. So if you have a good electrician in town, let me know.”
“We could use someone like you around here,” she says. “We have to go all the way into Bend to get a contractor to do any work. We’ve got Sam down the hill, but if he tells you it’ll take three weeks to do a job, you better tack on twelve months. And you say you’re gonna have the place ready for Christmas?”
“So she says,” Max interrupts again.
I’m beginning to wish I carried a pocket full of rubber bands that I could shoot at Max any time he says something annoying. But I doubt I have pockets big enough to hold that many bands.
“I’m going to do most of the plumbing myself, but do you have an electrician crew that you’ve worked with before?” I ask Darlene.
I could ask Max, but I don’t think he’s going to give me any information that’ll be useful.
Darlene gets up, grabs some paper, and jots down a couple of names. “Why don’t you try these guys,” she says. “They did my new shop out back, and they were pricey but good. There’s another company I know of that’s also little bit more affordable, but they did take longer than they said on my neighbor’s house.”
“Well, I am trying to have this done by the holidays, so maybe I should go with expensive and timely,” I say with a laugh.
“Perfect. That crew is also easy on the eyes,” Darlene says as she waggles her eyebrows. “Good thing you’re single. Maybe you can get to know them for the both of us.”
“Okay, on that note, we need to be going,” Max says with a grunt. He stands up and grabs the box.
He’s already out of the kitchen before I get a chance to respond.
“Thanks for the muffins, Darlene,” he calls over his shoulder.
I turn to respond to Darlene, but she winks. “If you’re not dating Max, then it sure seems like he wishes you were.”
I’m speechless because I’ve never heard anyone say anything completely wrong on so many levels.
Darlene is a wrong-way sign on the bottom of a hundred-foot drop.
Max is only annoyed with me. I’m slowing him down today. It has nothing to do with Darlene’s and my conversation.