Baroque and Desperate Read Online Free PDF

the gazelle hugged him back. “You know him?”
    â€œSure. He hangs around with my friend Caitlin. She’s going to puke when she hears about this.”
    â€œMaybe it’s not the same Tradd Maxwell,” I said hopefully. “This one is blond, and wears a gold chain around his neck that could wipe out the national debt.”
    â€œGive it up, Mama. He’s half your age.”
    â€œSo you do know him?” I would have dug a hole and crawled into it, except that the venerable old oak had a plethora of roots and my only tool was a nail file.
    â€œStick to someone your own age, Mama. Somebody old, like Greg.”
    I told Susan I loved her, despite her poor manners, and that if she ran into her brother, she should tell him the same thing. The love part, I mean. Charlie is as selfish as any nineteen-year-old boy, but he is seldom rude.
    Then, feeling like a balloon that has been deflated, chewed on by a slobbering puppy, and dragged through the dust, I went over to Mama’s.
    Â 
    Mama opened the door wearing a pink dress with a full skirt pouffed to ballet proportions by a trio of starched crinolines. Since it was the week after Labor Day, her shoes were black patent leather. Her pearls, as always, were white. Judging by her outfit, it could have been any day of the week.
    â€œCome in, dear, come in!”
    â€œI can’t, Mama. Dmitri’s in the car and—”
    Mama grabbed my right arm and yanked me into the foyer. “He’s just a cat. He’ll be fine if you parked in the shade.”
    â€œMama, is that a pork roast I smell?”
    She patted her pearls innocently. “I don’t smell anything.”
    That was like the pope saying he’d never been to church. Mama can smell what her sister Marilyn is cooking for supper over in Atlanta, and that’s a five-hour drive. She claims even to be able to smell trouble. I will admit to having a pretty good sniffer myself, but I am nothing like her.
    â€œMashed potatoes, pan gravy—black-eyed peas, and let’s see, peach cobbler for dessert. Am I right?”
    Mama shrugged, pulled me in, and closed the door behind me. “Please, dear, there’s no reason for the neighbors to hear.”
    â€œAm I right?”
    â€œYou forgot the garden salads.”
    Unlike my mother, I have a hard time smelling lettuce across a room. “This better not be for me, Mama. I told you I’d be stopping by for only a minute.”
    â€œEveryone has to eat lunch, Abby. And besides I thought that nice C.J. could join us.”
    For a fact, Mama is fond of C.J. For some strange reason the two of them giggle together like schoolgirls. But this was not the sort of lunch Mama fixes for single women. This was her snag-that-rich-handsome-bachelor-for-my-poor-divorced-daughter special.
    â€œSo you have heard of Mrs. Elias Burton Latham III, haven’t you?”
    â€œAbby, dear, everyone in the low country has heard of Genevieve Latham. Old Money Bags they call her down in Georgetown. But not me, of course—I would never say such a rude thing.”
    â€œOf course not, Mama. It would be foolish to gossip about prospective bridegrooms for your desperate daughter.”
    â€œWhy, Abby, how you talk!”
    â€œMama, don’t you have better things to do than to meddle in my life?”
    â€œNot a darn thing,” Mama sniffed and headed for the kitchen.
    The doorbell rang and I rushed to get it, but Mama beat me to the foyer. It’s amazing how fast she can run in high-heeled pumps.
    It was Tradd and C.J. He was just as handsome as ever, having ridden down from Charlotte with the top down—perhaps a bit more tanned even—but C.J. looked like something my Dmitri might have dragged in from under the back hedge.
    â€œHey, there,” Tradd said, flashing his set ofpearls at Mama. “Is your mother home?”
    â€œThis is Abby’s mother,” C.J. said dryly.
    Mama was beaming.