Chapter 6
Six
The next day, Floy called Judge Benton’s office.
Priscilla answered. “Benton Law Office.”
“Morning, Priscilla, this is Floy Beaudine. I need to make an appointment.”
“Of course,” she said. “Mr. Benton is free this afternoon from three to five, or tomorrow morning at nine o’clock. Would any of those times be convenient for you?”
“Three o’clock this afternoon. The sooner the better,” he said.
“Yes, sir. I have it scheduled. See you then.”
He disconnected, thinking about what he should bring to the appointment, and then remembered he didn’t have to bring anything. His wife’s criminal behavior precluded any claim she might have thrown at him.
He glanced at the clock, got a notepad and a pen, then sat down at the kitchen table and began making a list.
Lawyer at three.
New power cord for the weed-eater.
Post office to stop Mayrene’s mail being delivered to his house.
Then he put on work boots, got the wheelbarrow from the shed, parked it at the front porch, and began bringing unopened jars of canned green beans up from the basement and setting them on the front porch.
There were twenty-one jars. He’d counted. Next, he cobbled up a make-shift road sign and painted the word “Free” in white paint on the sign. Then he carried the sign and two 6 x 12 boards down to the road.
He hammered the sign into the ground, then laid the planks out on the grass like shelves and began bringing the jars of green beans down to the road in the wheelbarrow. He set the jars in two long, neat rows along the planks before going back into the house and down into the basement again.
The security camera would stay in place, but the basement was dim. He found an LED floodlight bulb, climbed up on a stepstool, removed the old bulb, and screwed the new one into the socket. The light immediately flooded the basement in a wash of light so bright it left no place to hide.
At that point, he began moving things around until order had been restored. He swept the cobwebs from the ceiling with a broom, then used the shop vac to clean up the basement floor. After he’d finished, he put the shop vac in a corner.
There was light and order, and he felt satisfied with what had been done, but he was tired, filthy, and dying for a drink of cold water, and a long hot shower as he climbed the steps.
He was already peeling off his clothes as he headed for the laundry room, then dumped them in the hamper, and walked naked through the house to shower, then back into his bedroom to get dressed.
It was a bit after one p.m. before he finally sat down to have lunch. In a little less than two hours, he would be sitting in Judge Benton’s law office, dotting another I, and crossing another T.
Chief Arnold was in cop mode. Two days ago, he’d begun drafting a formal criminal complaint and affidavit for wanton endangerment against Mayrene Beaudine and another for Quilla Schultz for aiding and abetting the same crime.
He’d worked on the wording for two days before submitting them to the Circuit Court Clerk to verify for probable cause.
Today, he’d submitted the complaints into the digital e-Warrant system to be signed by a judge. Now all he had to do was wait for the warrants to come back through the same digital system, signed and ready to serve.
He still felt bad about the overzealous way that he’d assumed a man’s guilt with nothing but a knee-jerk reaction to circumstances. It hadn’t done his personal profile any good. Even his wife was mad at him.
Publicly, he maintained he was just doing his duty and following protocol. Privately, he felt like a dumbass. He just didn’t have the balls to apologize.
Floy walked into the lawyer’s office sporting aviator sunglasses, his overly long hair still brushing the nape of his neck. He wore tight black jeans, a Grateful Dead T-shirt, and boots worn down at the heels.
Priscilla looked up but didn’t recognize the man until he took off his sunglasses.
“Oh, Floy! Right on time,” she muttered, flustered by the sight of him. Never in the history of ever had she considered Floy Beaudine as sexy. And he’d just walked in and shot that opinion down without a word. She buzzed the intercom. “Mr. Benton, your three o’clock appointment is here.”
Judge opened the door to his office within seconds. “Come in, Floy. Come in.”
The moment the door shut between them, Priscilla turned back to the computer screen, trying to remember what she’d been doing, then shook off the shock and went back to work.
As soon as Floy was seated, Judge picked up a pen and pulled a yellow legal pad in front of him. “So, you’re seeking a divorce.”
Floy was sitting upright, one leg crossed over a knee, with his hands lightly threaded and lying flat against his stomach.
“An immediate, no-contest divorce. You may or may not know that she’s the one who’s been letting Elvis out for the past five years, trying to cause me enough trouble to force me to get rid of him.
The whole ugly story of the ensuing escape is all over town.
I have no desire to repeat it. What you need to know is that I caught her on a security camera releasing him.
She admitted it and that her mother had encouraged it.
The house belongs to me. My father built it.
I grew up in it. She has been informed there will be no forthcoming alimony.
No settlement. Not anything. Because of her egregious acts that caused me physical, financial, and emotional harm.
I gave her an hour to remove her personal belongings, or I would have set fire to what was left.
I have removed her from every aspect of my life except ending this marriage.
As far as I know, Chief Arnold might be looking to press charges against her and Quilla for wanton endangerment.
Write up the papers that dissolve a marriage, while plainly stating there will be no monetary gain, or any kind of claim, against anything that was mine before her arrival in my life. ”
Judge blinked. “You’re sure you—”
“I came this close to putting a gun to my head because I thought my snake had swallowed her. After the vet confirmed Elvis had swallowed a hog, her continued absence turned the chief into a hillbilly version of Sherlock Holmes, but without the sidekick Watson to curb his ego or his mania.”
Judge blinked. Gun to his head? Hillbilly version of Sherlock Holmes?
Who was this man, and what had he done with Floy Beaudine?
Now Judge was not only noticing the acerbic manner of Floy’s attitude, but also the physical change in Floy’s appearance.
He didn’t look like the Fix-It man with the baggy pants and the tool belt he’d always worn like a holster around his waist. He looked like a badass who’d ridden in on a Harley and was ready to throw down on the first person who looked at him wrong.
Judge nodded. “Okay . . . I think I have the picture. This is very straightforward. Since time is of the essence, would you be available tomorrow afternoon to come back and sign the papers? Say around four o’clock?”
“Yes,” Floy said. “How much is this going to cost me?”
Judge blinked. He started to quote his usual fee when he saw a muscle jerking at the side of Floy’s jaw. The man was trying to climb out of a hell not of his making.
“How’s two hundred dollars sound?” Judge asked and saw the tension slide from Floy’s shoulders.
“Doable,” Floy said. He stood, then shook Judge’s hand before seeing himself out.
Judge walked out of his office and stopped at Priscilla’s desk. “Basic divorce form. No settlement, no alimony. Mention that in the wording. Her personal property has already been received. She has no claim on anything else. It all belonged to Floy before he met her.”
Priscilla sighed. “I don’t know the details of what that woman did to him, but it has honed and sharpened that man into one fine specimen of a hottie.”
Judge blinked.
Priscilla took Judge’s notes and laid them on her desk for reference as she began to type.
“Oh . . . He’s coming in tomorrow afternoon at four to sign the papers,” Judge added.
She paused to add that to the office calendar. “Then what?”
“Then we call a process server to deliver the good news.”
She frowned. “Do we know where Mayrene is staying?”
“With her mother, Quilla Schultz. It’s a residence up the mountain.
You should be able to get an address from Chief Arnold,” he said, and went back into his office, thanking his lucky stars he’d never been stoned enough to want to get married.
He and Moses had survived parents who beat up their sons, beat up each other, and drank themselves into early graves.
Floy returned the next day, read over the wording in the document twice, then asked one question.
“Can this be contested?”
“Even the most frivolous of lawsuits can be filed, but it doesn’t mean they’ll go anywhere.
The existing footage of your wife’s criminal behavior with the intent to cause you loss of income and emotional distress, which also added to the endangerment of an entire community, will most certainly nullify any claim she might make,” Judge said.
Floy picked up the pen and signed it, then laid a check for two hundred dollars onto Judge’s desk. “Are we done?”
Judge smiled. “She’ll be served. I will receive a notice from the server of the signed receipt of delivery.
Legally, she is given a certain number of days for negotiation, but since there’s nothing to negotiate and she knows it, I doubt you will get a response.
We’ll just have to see. You will be officially notified when the divorce has been finalized, and you will receive the papers to prove it. So, yes, we’re done for today.”
Floy stood, shook the hand Judge offered, still unaware of the look Priscilla was giving him as he walked past her desk. Those fitted jeans were doing wonders for her imagination. Who knew all that had been beneath old work clothes?