Carol Clark - Hitched

“It couldn’t be,” Jack muttered as he stared at Victoria.

“Is he with her? Where does she live, Regan?” Tracy screamed. “Where? I’ve got to go find them!”

“I’ll pull the car around,” Catherine, her ever-faithful friend, cried.

“And, Regan,” Jack said quickly as he continued to stare at the screen. “Do you know where she works?”

Regan looked from one to the other. “She lives on the Upper West Side and she works at the Queen’s Court Hotel in Midtown.” She knew why Tracy was reacting the way she was. But why was Jack so interested? He pulled out his cell phone and dialed his office.

“Where on the Upper West Side?” Tracy asked Regan. “I want her address.”

Kit blurted it out.

Tracy turned to go.

“Wait just a minute!” Jack said to her. “I think I’m going to ride up there as well. You can come with me.”

“What about my friends?”

“I can fit five people. The others will have to follow us.”

“Jack, what’s going on?” Regan asked as Jack finished his call.

Jack leaned over and whispered in Regan’s ear. “That little lady up there,” Jack said, pointing up at the frozen picture of Victoria on the screen, her index finger pointing upward as it rested on her cheek, “works at a hotel where the guy who owns the stolen credit card stayed. A receipt used by the thief of that stolen credit card was found on the floor of the bank that was robbed yesterday.”

Regan’s eyes widened. “You don’t think…?”

“I don’t know, Regan.”

“Kit and I are going with you.”

Tracy, Kit, and Catherine jumped in the back of Jack’s car. Regan and Jack were in the front. Claire and Linda were in a car right behind them.

“That idiot!” Tracy cried. “He must have met her at Alfred and Charisse’s salon!”

Wait till Alfred hears this, Regan thought. And wait till he hears that he might have vouched for the integrity of someone who’s been robbing banks for the past three months.

Two of his April Brides are criminals. And the third is in hysterics in the backseat.

Jack had ordered a police car to keep watch on Victoria ’s block. She had rushed back inside her apartment building after blowing off the reporter. Armed with her description, they were to contact Jack immediately if she came back out.

Now as they sped up the West Side Highway, Jack’s mind was racing. If Victoria was the bank robber, she did a great job of passing herself off as a man. And if indeed she had stolen Tracy ’s fiancé, she knew how to make good use of her feminine wiles. But I can’t prove anything, he thought. Not yet. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do.

Of course, he hadn’t revealed his suspicions to Tracy and her friends.

The car exited the highway at Seventy-second Street, headed over to Broadway, and turned left. When they got to Victoria ’s block, they turned right. A patrol car was parked on the corner. Jack stopped the car and called out to the patrolman in the driver’s seat.

“All’s quiet, Jack,” the cop reported. “A woman came out with a couple of kids. That’s about it.”

“Okay.”

“Someone’s coming out of her building,” Kit exclaimed as a car passed them on the left, pulled up to Victoria ’s building, and stopped.

“That’s Jeffrey’s car!” Tracy screeched.

“Oh my God!” Jack breathed.

“What?” Regan asked as they all watched a bearded, mustached man wearing a dark raincoat scurry over and open the door to Jeffrey’s car.

“Is Jeffrey with a man?” Tracy cried.

“No, Tracy!” Jack said swiftly. “That’s a woman behind that beard.” He gave the signal to his patrolman, and they both turned on their sirens. At the end of the block, Jeffrey had no choice but to pull over. When Tracy got out of Jack’s car, Jeffrey turned white as a ghost. Television cameras seemed to appear out of nowhere.

But when Jack announced that he wanted Victoria to answer a few questions about their investigation into a string of bank robberies, Jeffrey almost passed out, the first of many times in the coming days when he’d be in need of smelling salts: When the television stations repeatedly ran the videos of Jeffrey and a bearded Victoria getting out of the car. When Victoria was officially accused of robbing the banks. And the clincher: when Jeffrey found out that she didn’t dump her fiancé to be with him.

Frederick never existed. Victoria had visualized a husband. That’s why she bought the dress. She figured if she really felt like a bride, she’d end up one. And it had almost worked. She’d nabbed Jeffrey in the elevator at Alfred and Charisse’s salon. Only problem was that she not only visualized herself as a bride, she visualized herself as a bank robber so she could afford Alfred and Charisse’s prices. And she was a credit card thief to boot.

All in all, Victoria Beardsley was not the answer to Jeffrey’s dreams.

She was the beginning of his downfall.

And Tracy Timber loved every minute of it.

The celebration at Club Zee started to die down at around five. They’d all watched the footage of Jeffrey and Victoria getting out of the car. The image of a bearded Victoria throwing her arms around Jeffrey was a sight to behold.

Joyce thanked Wally for his hospitality and everyone else for being part of the search party. “I’m going to have my foot checked out at the emergency room. But please. Come out to my house anytime after eight tonight. We’re ordering pizzas. I feel like I have a new lease on life and I don’t want to stop celebrating!”

At the hospital, Joyce was examined and her foot was X-rayed. Other than a bad sprain, she was given a clean bill of health.

Tom and Cindy were with her. “Let’s go get my car,” he said, “and I’ll drive you home.”

Joyce started to say something, then stopped.

“Is something wrong?” he asked.

Joyce smiled up at him. “Nothing at all.”

Cindy decided it was time to interfere. “I think Joyce wants to warn you that her ex-boyfriend might show up. But we plan to pack up his things and throw them out on the street.”

“Thanks, Cindy. You have a gift for getting straight to the point,” Joyce said with a smile.

“Your ex doesn’t worry me,” Tom said with a strength that made Joyce feel tingly.

An hour later, Joyce was settled on the couch in the living room, her foot on the coffee table, her crutches leaning on the edge of the couch, and most important, Tom right next to her. Cindy called the pizzeria and placed a big order, then opened up a few bottles of red wine.

By 8:01, Joyce’s house was bustling with activity. Romeo was going crazy.

“Hello!” he called from his cage. “Hello!”

Regan and Kit and Tracy and her friends arrived together. Like Joyce, Tracy was enjoying a new lease on life. “Let’s turn on the TV,” she said, reveling in the images of Jeffrey’s public humiliation.

Brianne was sitting on Pauly’s lap, looking like a woman in love.

The mood was one of celebration.

Joyce’s crutches fell to the floor. “Let me get them out of the way,” Regan offered. She picked them up. “I’ll stick them in the front closet.” She opened the door, and there was another pair of crutches staring her in the face. “Joyce, it looks like you didn’t need these.”

Joyce waved her hand. “They’re my ex’s. He was hurt on the job and milked his injury for all it was worth.”

“I personally think that limp of his is fake,” Cindy stated as she sipped her wine.

Regan’s cell phone rang. She looked at the caller ID but couldn’t tell who it was. “You mind if I take this in the bedroom?” she asked Joyce. “It’s a little noisy in here.”