Trust Me (8 page)

C
arly wanted to go back to her apartment first, and Max knew by her brief hesitation that she didn’t want him to come inside.
But good manners won, and she awkwardly invited him in to relax while she changed her clothes. Curious about the reason for
her reluctance, and aware that the apartment would offer some clues about her, Max accepted.

“It’s kind of messy,” she said, fumbling for her keys outside the front door. “I was in a rush this morning.”

She lived in a converted basement apartment on the edge of the Haight-Ashbury district, which had been famous years ago as
a hub of sixties counterculture. It still retained a certain seedy charm, if you liked ragged Victorian houses with dreadlocked
teenagers lounging on the front steps.

A Frisbee flew out of nowhere and skidded across the hood of Max’s car.

“Sorry, man.” A lanky person of indeterminate sex, wearing a rainbow-colored T-shirt, came to retrieve it. He—Max assumed
that it was a he—paused to survey the Jaguar. “Dude, that’s some car.”

“Thanks,” Max said.

“Yeah,” the person said. “It’s like, very capitalistic. Very 1980s.”

“Damn right,” Max said, and Carly giggled.

“I don’t think that was meant as a compliment,” she said. “You must not be from around these parts.”

“Capitalism has been good to me,” Max growled. “I was building a company while that kid was sucking his thumb and learning
to be self-righteous.”

Carly’s smile grew, but she didn’t answer.

Her apartment was tiny, with low ceilings that made Max feel too tall, and he was surprised by the frugality with which it
was decorated. A colorful crocheted blanket covered the worn sofa, and the few battered pieces of furniture in the living
room were solid and of good quality, but not old enough to be antique. A desk in the corner was piled high with books; paperback
mysteries mixed in with veterinary journals.

“It’s not big, but it’s home,” Carly said, and Max glanced at her, detecting an artificial brightness to her tone.

“It’s cozy,” he said, privately curious as to why a young professional like Carly would choose a neighborhood and apartment
like this, when she certainly could have afforded better.

“It was a good deal,” she said. “I’m hardly ever here, anyway.” A quick frown flitted across her face, as if she knew that
she sounded defensive. “Can I get you something to drink? I have water, and… water. Sorry. I was planning to go to the store,
but I—”

“Water sounds fine,” Max said. “Thank you.”

She brought him a glass, then disappeared into the bedroom to change, promising to be quick. Max sat down briefly but felt
too restless to stay on the couch. He stood up and began to explore the room. He picked up a tattered copy of
Dog Fancy
magazine and paged through it, glancing at the photos with mild distaste. He put it down and wandered toward the window,
which was barred for security and surrounded by built-in shelves, their edges thick and blunted by too many layers of cheap
white paint. A stubby little potted fern sat there, struggling toward the light. Next to the fern was a row of framed photos.
There was Carly, in cap and gown, flanked by a beaming couple, who were clearly her parents. And there she was again, a gangly
teenager in this picture, on a lawn with her parents and seven other children.

Max squinted curiously at the photo, noticing that the kids ranged from a tall red-haired young man to a dark-haired, almond-eyed
pair of Asian toddlers. There was no family resemblance among the group as a whole, but the camera had captured a sense of
loving familiarity that suggested otherwise.

Interesting,
Max thought, replacing the picture, trying to ignore a sudden tightening in his throat at the sight of those joyful, innocent
faces. Those kids, whoever they were, had never spent a moment worrying about where they would sleep that night or where their
next meal was coming from. They were among the blessed, and probably didn’t even know it.

“Oh, you found my family.”

Max turned to see Carly standing in the doorway of her bedroom. His eyes widened at the sight of her. She was wearing a long
dark skirt in some kind of loose, gauzy material, and a snug, cream-colored sweater. Her hair was in a low ponytail, and tiny
gold hoops gleamed on her ear-lobes.

The transformation was impressive, but Max had had plenty of practice in keeping a poker face. He looked away, motioning toward
the pictures. “The whole group is your family?”

“Every last one of them,” she said, walking toward him. Lifting the lawn photo, she gazed at it fondly. “This is an old one.
I was about fifteen here, so this was right before Josh went off to college. It was the last time we all lived at home. Mom
and Dad had a houseful, didn’t they?”

“Josh is the tall boy?”

“Right, he’s my oldest brother. He’s a hotshot stockbroker. Then there’s Jeannie and me and Amanda, Chris, Kevin, and the
twins, Anna and Alex. They’re thirteen now.” She sighed. “They’re growing up so fast.”

“You have an unusual-looking family.”

Carly chuckled. “Every shape and size. I’m the third child. My parents wanted a houseful of kids, but Mom had a very difficult
pregnancy with me, so when I was two, they decided to start adopting.”

Max had suspected as much, but hearing her confirm it raised a wave of emotion inside him. The feeling did not result as much
from discovering that an average-seeming couple like Carly’s parents had taken on the awesome responsibility of adopting five
children, as it did from the simple feeling of normalcy that the photo conveyed. It was completely at odds with his own dark,
turbulent memories of the foster homes he had passed through as he struggled to reach eighteen. Some had been benign, merely
doing him no harm, and others had left scars that he still carried.

There had been a time when he had dreamed of a family like Carly’s, of sane discipline, warm affection, and of people who
valued him for more than the monthly government check he brought them. After a while, he had stopped believing that they were
out there at all. Apparently, he just hadn’t been one of the lucky ones.

Carly set the photo back on the shelf. “We should go,” she said. “I need to stop at Henry’s house and feed the pets. We should
have gone there first, but I wasn’t thinking clearly. It’s going to take me a while to get into the habit of this.”

Max shook off the dark cloak of melancholy that was closing around him and looked down into Carly’s clear blue eyes. “We can
easily call Pauline and have her take care of it.”

“Friday is Pauline’s night off,” Carly said. “Anyway, that’s not her job. She and Henry have an agreement. She doesn’t do
windows or pets.”

Max frowned, swallowing the protest that came to his lips. He hadn’t planned on another visit to the house so soon, and didn’t
like the idea much at all. Being there had a strong emotional impact on him, and that night he needed a clear head. But there
was a stubborn look on Carly’s face, and he sensed that the issue wasn’t up for discussion.

Well, there was certainly no reason that he couldn’t handle standing in front of the damned house for fifteen minutes while
Carly went inside and took care of business.

“Fine,” he said, looking pointedly at his watch. It was after seven. If they missed their dinner reservations and ended up
jammed into the crowded restaurant bar while they waited for a table to open up, the mood would be ruined. He would have to
keep a close eye on the time. “Let’s go.”

When they arrived at the house, there were four large, white sacks piled like carcasses around one of the stone gargoyles.
Only his horned head and the curled lump of his tail were visible, and Carly thought that he looked annoyed by such disrespectful
treatment.

“Great,” she said. “The dog food arrived.”

Max prodded one of the sacks with his toe. “This is all dog food?”

“Believe it or not, this is a short-term supply. I noticed this morning that we were getting low, so I phoned all the bulk
suppliers in the area, figured out who had been handling Henry’s account, and asked them to make an emergency delivery. They
let me have it on credit, which is a good thing. Do you have any idea how much it costs to buy two hundred pounds of kibble?”

Carly unlocked the front door and gestured down at the sacks. “Help me carry these inside, would you?”

He frowned. “Inside?”

“Yes. That’s where the dogs eat, so that’s where we need it.”

There was an odd expression on Max’s face as he stared at the open doorway. “Right now?”

What was the matter with him? “Right now,” Carly agreed. “It’s dinnertime.”

But still, he didn’t budge. “The delivery people should have hauled it in. That’s part of their damn job.”

“Well, they didn’t,” Carly said. “I’ll try to arrange that for next time, but right now, we have four large sacks that can’t
walk, and I need you to help me carry them.”

He didn’t answer, and his face was as immobile as stone. Carly found herself getting irritated. “What’s the matter? Are these
big bags too heavy for you? Been spending too much time behind a desk, Max?”

That snapped him out of it. “Hardly,” he said. He shot a hard, almost defiant look at the house. “You want me to bring in
the food? Fine. You got it.”

He reached down, grabbed one bulky sack, and slung it over his shoulder as easily as if it were a feather pillow. She blinked,
taken aback, as he strode past her into the darkened entry hall. He stopped and turned to look at her. “Where do you want
it?”

Carly swallowed. “Kitchen. Please.”

“Fine. Where is it?”

“Next to the solarium.”

“And where is that?” Max asked coldly.

“In the back of the house, right where it’s always been…” She paused, startled. “Max, haven’t you ever been here before?”

“No,” he said, and started down the hall, leaving her standing in the doorway, surprised and concerned, her mouth filled with
unvoiced questions.

She caught up with him just outside the kitchen. Her arms were wrapped awkwardly around a heavy sack, and as she was supporting
it on her raised knee, attempting to free one hand to turn the knob, the kitchen door suddenly opened inward.

Carly squawked, lost her balance, and pitched forward through the open doorway. The bag of food hit the floor with a crunchy
thump, and a second later, so did she.

“Ouch.” She looked up from her inelegant position on the kitchen linoleum to see Max gazing down at her.

“Sorry,” he said, offering her a hand. “I didn’t know you were there.”

“That’s good. I’d hate to think you did it on purpose.” His fingers closed around hers, and she felt his strength as he pulled
her easily to her feet.

“About that desk-job joke,” she said, brushing herself off. “I didn’t mean it. Nobody would ever mistake you for a weakling.”

“Or a three-martini CEO? I’ve made a point of avoiding that.”

“Yes, I can see. What do you do, lift weights?”

“Only when there’s no dog food around.”

His expression hadn’t changed, and it took her a moment to realize that he was being dryly humorous. She smiled at him and
bent to pick up the fallen sack.

“I’ll get that,” Max said. “This is my job, isn’t it?”

Carly hoisted the bag, staggering slightly under the weight. “You’re looking at a woman who lifted an eighty-pound Rottweiler
onto an X-ray table today. When I say help me with the dog food, I don’t mean do it yourself, I mean help me.”

“Eighty pounds?”

“Well, maybe seventy,” she amended breathlessly. “He was only a year old. And one of the technicians might have given him
a little boost from the back. You know how it is.”

Max lifted the bag from her arms. “Find something else to do. I’ll handle the food.”

Carly, feeling a twinge in her lower back, didn’t argue.

She had left the dogs outside in the fenced backyard while she was at work, and when she opened the kitchen door, she found
them all sitting eagerly on the porch, having heard activity in the kitchen and surmising that it was dinnertime.

They looked faintly disappointed when, instead of letting them in, Carly stepped outside and closed the door behind her.

“Soon,” she said, to the array of wagging tails and curious stares. “Ten minutes. I don’t think Max needs another dose of
you guys right now. You can be a little overwhelming to people who aren’t used to pets.”

Henry’s back lawn had been carefully landscaped for privacy, and the artful, though overgrown, border of trees and shrubs
girdling the expanse of grass almost disguised the fact that a city street lay just beyond the hidden fence. It was a dog
paradise, complete with a small pond for splashing, and judging from the condition of the dogs’ coats, there had been a lot
of splashing that afternoon.

“You’re a mess,” Carly said sternly to the group, and was met with several wide grins. She threw a tennis ball for them for
a while, then checked back into the kitchen and found all four bags of food stacked neatly in the pantry. There was no sign
of Max.

He still hadn’t appeared by the time the dog pack was crunching happily at their bowls. Was he waiting for her in the car?
Carly was puzzled. Either he disliked dogs more than she had thought, or something strange was going on. She considered it
as she walked back down the long hall. It seemed unbelievable that he had never been in Henry’s house before. What kind of
bizarre relationship would keep him from ever visiting his grandfather, yet leave him as the old man’s trustee?