Right Beside You by Mary Monroe

Author:Mary Monroe
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kensington Books
Published: 2019-08-22T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 15

RICHARD

“Daddy, I hope you have a good day,” Carol told me as we prepared to leave for the day this morning. She was sitting on the couch, pulling on her Ugg boots.

“I’m sure I will. I’m having lunch with a very special lady today.” I snatched my overcoat off the rack by the front door and had to force myself not to show how giddy I was.

“Regina?” Marva asked as she entered the living room already bundled up and ready to go.

“I said a very special lady.” All three of us laughed. “You girls remember Felicia, one of the ladies I work with? We went to her Christmas Eve party last year.”

“That party was fun!” Marva gushed. “Felicia hugged us, but she didn’t give us any presents. She’s real cool, though. We see her a lot all over the place. When we visited Grandma and Grandpa Labor Day weekend, we bumped into Felicia at Olive Garden. We had to wait for a table and when she came in after us by herself, we all stood together by the wall. Grandma and Grandpa must really like her because they got all over her right away—and you know how picky they can be.”

“I didn’t know they knew her well enough to ‘get all over her,’ ” I said.

Carol gave me an exasperated look as she wrapped her muffler around her neck. “Daddy, you and your memory. They met Felicia at Mama’s funeral. She helped serve food when we came home from the church. And did you know that she came to the house a couple of days later to help Grandma and Aunt Minnie pack up Mom’s stuff that we didn’t want to keep? She even took it to Goodwill because they were too sad to do it.”

“I don’t remember,” I muttered. Margaret’s passing had been so traumatic for me, I no longer remembered some of the things that occurred during that period. I did recall Felicia being among the mourners at the church and later at my house, but everything else was a blur.

“Grandpa told Felicia that she and the friend she was waiting on could sit with us if they wanted to. But she said she’d rather not because she had some personal things she needed to discuss with her friend,” Carol went on. “Grandpa got excited when Felicia told him that her brother was a big important private investigator in Atlanta. And he and Grandma were real impressed when she told us how she’d talked her parents into taking the six-month trip around the world they’d planned, instead of canceling it to stay home and take care of Felicia’s mom’s mother. When the Olive Garden hostess came to escort us to our table, Grandma and Grandpa hugged Felicia and told her she’s welcome to come visit them anytime she wants. As we were walking away, I saw a man come in the door and kiss her on the cheek. I guess he was her boyfriend.”

“He looked like Steve Harvey did when he still had hair,” Marva added.

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