Last Breath (The Good Daughter 0.5)(12)

Maude selected one, then used the bottom of her shirt to twist off the cap. She tilted back her head and drank down half the contents before she looked at Charlie again. “You gonna just stand there or are you gonna start talking?”

“If Rusty needs some help…” Leroy held up his hands, indicating the apartment. “Not much we can do for him.”

“No, it’s not that. I’m here on behalf of Flora.”



Maude glanced at Leroy. “I told you your little princess was up to no good.”

Leroy’s easier nature was gone. He sat up in his chair. He leaned toward Charlie. “You one of her teachers?”

“Why the hell would a teacher be here?” Maude demanded. “School’s been out for summer since—”

“Teachers work over the summer,” Leroy said.

“No, they don’t. They barely work during the year.”

Charlie jumped in, saying, “I’m a friend.” She realized how weird that sounded. Not many fifteen-year-olds had twenty-eight-year-old friends. “A fellow Girl Scout.”

Maude said, “I thought that was what’s-her-bitch? Melinda?”

“Belinda. She’s the leader. I was speaking at the meeting this morning.”

“Shit.” This came from Leroy. “You’re a lawyer, right? ‘On behalf of Flora.’”

Maude caught his train of thought. She asked Charlie, “What bullshit did that girl put in your head?”

Leroy jumped back in. “The wrong bullshit, I can tell you that right now.”

Charlie wasn’t going to let Meemaw and Paw tag-team her. “It doesn’t seem like bullshit to me.”

Maude snorted a laugh. “She tell you about the trust? You trying to get your dirty little hands on her money?”

Leroy snorted again, too. “Fucking lawyers. Always trying to steal what don’t belong to them.” He pointed his finger at Charlie. “That stuff I said about your dad—he could go to prison for that shit. Don’t think I won’t flip on him.”

The threat fell short of its mark. Charlie knew her father played it fast and loose with the law, but he would never be so stupid as to get caught, especially by a loser like Leroy Faulkner. She told him, “Your granddaughter wants to file for legal emancipation from you.”

Neither Leroy nor Maude spoke for a moment.



Leroy cleared his throat. “Emancipation, like she thinks she’s a slave?”

“No, you dumbass,” Maude said. “It means she’ll be an adult in the eyes of the law. That we won’t be her guardians anymore.”

Leroy scratched the scar on his cheek. His expression was hard enough to send a chill down Charlie’s spine.

He said, “Over my dead body that girl gets emancipated.”

Maude said, “She probably wants to live with Nancy. Or Oliver, more like.”

Charlie asked, “Oliver?”

“Nancy’s brother. They been dating since she was fourteen.”

Charlie felt blindsided. Flora had left out the boyfriend.

“He’s nineteen years old,” Maude said. “Only wants her for one thing.”

“That thing won’t be worth shit once he’s finished with it.” Leroy stared at the TV. “Stupid girl.”

Charlie felt her mouth go dry. She tried to break down what Leroy had said, to decipher what he meant about Flora’s worth. Was he just a run-of-the-mill sexist asshole who thought a girl’s value was wrapped up between her legs, or was he a super-predator asshole who didn’t want someone else ruining his good thing?

For her part, Maude seemed oblivious to the remark. She told Charlie, “Oliver already has a rap sheet as long as my dick. He ain’t got a job, ain’t got no prospects for a job. Hell, Flora might as well stay here as soon as live with that dipshit.”

Leroy jammed a finger Charlie’s way. “You can go back and tell her this ain’t gonna happen.”

“Damn straight,” Maude agreed. “I’m not letting that child run wild. It’ll be exactly like with her mother, only worse because she’ll blow through that money like it’s water.”

Charlie asked, “What happened to the Porsche?”

Another prolonged silence followed the question.

“What Porsche?” Maude locked eyes with Charlie, even as she put the beer bottle to her mouth. The end tipped up. Her throat worked like a goose being readied for paté as she drank down the contents.



Leroy shifted in his chair. Charlie realized he was trying to work up enough momentum to stand. Just as she was reflexively reaching out to help, he hurled himself up to his feet.

He said, “Get some fresh air with me, will ya?”

“Watch yourself,” Maude warned her husband, but she didn’t try to stop him.

Leroy walked stiffly, swinging his straightened left leg out like he was part of the Queen’s guard as he propelled himself toward the door. He let Charlie leave first, then followed her with the same awkward gait.

Charlie squinted in the unrelenting sunlight. Tears rimmed her eyes. She had left her sunglasses in her car.

Leroy said, “Thiss’a way.”

She followed him down the broken sidewalk to the side of the building that backed onto a forest. This was the kind of thing that Ben had warned her about—being led out to a secluded location by a man that set off so many warning signs in her head that Charlie might as well be living inside the siren at a fire station.