Finley Blake and her life partner Max Davies were debating whether to stay in or go out for a late lunch one lazy Sunday in May when her phone buzzed. As she turned the page of the Sunday New York Times to continue reading an article that had caught her eye, she considered letting it ring unanswered. Whoever it was could call later or leave a text message like normal people do.
But what if it’s Mama? Or Whitt? What if something’s happened?
The scenarios raced through her mind as the phone continued to ring. With Whitt and David in Tbilisi for the next several months and Mama and Daddy back in Chevy Chase, she was always unsettled by the distances between her in London and the rest of the family scattered all over the world. Given the long hours it would take to get to them in case of an emergency, would she get there in time?
She startled Max by jumping up from the kitchen table mid-sentence and grabbing her phone from the large marble island that was the heart of Max’s mews house, now their home when they weren’t traveling.
“Fin, what’s wrong?” Max asked as she flipped over the phone and stared at the screen, temporarily frozen in place.
Her eyes remained fixed on her phone for several seconds before she heard her voice say his name. “Grant. It’s Grant.”
Grant, her former husband. The one who lived in Greenwich, Connecticut with his darling petite, blond, Junior League wife and their perfect two-children-and-a-dog family. Finley hadn’t seen her ex in almost a decade. Since returning from Morocco the first time. Then she had been just on the other side of healing from a breakup with Max and had gone with Mooney Allen, her best friend and protector, to a gallery opening in Soho. The exchange with Grant and his wife there had been brief and cordial.
Max leaned back in his seat at the table. “What does he want?” His voice was neutral, betraying little beyond genuine curiosity.
“I don’t know. Let’s find out.” Finley bit the inside of her lip and pressed the answer button. “Hello?”
There was a pause and then a rush of words, as if the connection had been broken before being quickly mended.
“Finley? Finley? This is Grant! Thank goodness it worked.” Grant’s voice was excited, almost frantic. The patchy reception didn’t help.
“Grant, what a surprise! How are you and ---” Finley started before Grant cut in.
“Finley, I don’t have much time. I’m in Spoleto. In jail. They say I killed Blaine. My wife. I didn’t. They say I pushed her off the train. I swear I didn’t. I didn’t know where else to turn. I can’t call my lawyer in the States. It would ruin me! Finley, for God’s sake, help me!”
Finley’s brow creased, “Grant, I’m not sure how I can. I’m not a practicing attorney and even if I were, I can’t practice in Italy. Why didn’t you call a lawyer there?”
“I don’t need a lawyer. I need a friend who can get to me quickly, help me think clearly” Grant’s voice cracked, “I’m scared. I don’t know what to do. Please help me!”
Finley could hear a staccato of words in Italian in the background. She covered the mic with her hand as she quickly turned to Max. “How’s your Italian?”
“Passable,” Max replied. “ But what’s going on?”
Finley moved swiftly to the kitchen table and turned on the phone speaker. The Italian background directives continued.
“Do you understand what they are saying?” Finley turned to Max and pushed the phone closer to him.
“It’s hard to hear clearly, but I think they are telling him he has to end the call,” Max whispered.
Grant returned to the phone, more frantic than before. “ They say I have to go back to the cell. Finley, please help me!”
“Grant, calm down. Where exactly are you? You mentioned Spoleto.”
Before she could get any more information, a man came on the line and began speaking roughly and rapidly in Italian. Max picked up the phone and moved it toward his mouth. Finley could understand very little of what was said for the next several minutes, but whatever Max said had changed the spout of directives into a seemingly cordial conversation. In time, Max grabbed a pen that was lying about and scribbled a name and address on the margin of the newspaper section he had been reading.
“Grazie. Grazie mille per il suo aiuto” was all she heard Max say before the screen when black.
“So, what’s the deal?” Finley poured more coffee into Max’s cup and then topped off hers. “Is he really in a Spoleto jail?”
Max nodded with a scowl on his face. “Charged with murdering his wife.”
“That can’t be right. Grant may be a lot of things, but he’s not a killer.”
“When did you last see him?”
“When I came back from Morocco the first time.”
“That was ten years ago. A lot can change in that time.”
Finley pondered what Max had said. A lot had changed in that time. She had returned to Morocco, run into Max and ended up entering into a committed permanent relationship with him, a lifelong partnership without marriage--an institution that he abhorred for a range of reasons that Finley understood and accepted. She suspected that Grant and Blaine had also changed in ways that she knew nothing about. That said, she seriously doubted that so much had changed that Grant had morphed into a murderer.
“Yes. I suppose. But what did you learn? Grant sounded panicked beyond belief. I guess I would be too. Not understanding the language, the rules.”
“The policeman I spoke with said that he had been arrested just outside of Spoleto. Something about Grant leaving a train. The train was going from Florence to Rome. Grant reported his wife missing an hour or so after they left Florence. Police boarded the train in Perugia and checked for her. His account was all over the place.”
“Could she have accidentally gotten off at the wrong stop?
“They thought of that. By the time they reached Spoleto, they had alerted police between Florence and Orvieto and all in between, in case she got off. Grant got off the train to look for her. That was three days ago.”
“Three days! Why is he just calling now?” Finley took a sip of her coffee and looked over the rim at Max.
“Because they just decided to charge him with murder.”
“Did the guy on the phone say how they reached that conclusion? From ‘my wife is missing’ to ‘you must have killed her’? That’s a pretty big jump.”
“He didn’t go into too much detail, but that is what they’re now thinking.”
Finley shook her head and shrugged in disbelief. “And what are we supposed to do?”
“I must admit I’m a little baffled as to why he called you.”
“That makes two of us.” Finley rubbed her cup against her lower lip as she thought.
“How did he even knew where to find you?”
“I guess he thought of anyone he knew in Europe and we came to mind. The number he dialed was my old US WhatsApp, which I haven’t used in years. A shot in the dark, I suppose. He was surprised the number still worked.”
“So what are you going to do now? I have the address of the police station in Spoleto. They don’t have a body or a weapon, so they are still investigating. But as far as they are concerned they have a theory and a suspect.”
“Now I understand why he was panicked. While we think this over, can we find food? I’m hungry.” Finley grabbed the coffee cups and walked over to the sink.
Max intercepted her as she opened the dishwasher to deposit the rinsed cups. He pulled her to him. “Yes, we will feed you. And then we need to figure out how to extricate you from this thankless situation.”
The walk up the lane to the high street was a short one. The few steps to the Canterbury Arms, one of their favorite pubs, was familiar. Finley remembered passing it the first time she had visited Max in London. It had been just after the eventful trip to Jaipur during which David and Whitt had gotten engaged, her dear friend Logan had met Hema who was soon to be his wife, and she and Max had almost lost each other forever. Instead of splitting up, however, they had reconciled and cemented their relationship as life partners.
They chose a table in the garden with a smattering of sun, taking advantage of the warm day, which had also been blessed with cooling breezes. When they had perused the late-lunch specials and ordered, they returned to the earlier conversation.
“Did they tell you why they switched from thinking she was missing to being sure that she’s dead?” Finley took a sip on the South African Chenin Blanc.
“Nope. I suspect they looked for her, couldn’t find her and cooked up a nice story about him getting rid of his wife to go live with his mistress in Portofino.”
Finley’s eyes widened. “Is that what the policeman said?”
“No, sweetheart! I’m making this up, but I don’t think it’s far from the truth.” Max shook his head. “The officer communicated only bits of information, most of it unclear – except for the name and location of the station.”
“Then we’ll have to get the facts from Grant when we get there.” Finley said as she leaned back to let the waiter place her eggs Benedict on the table in front of her.
Max waited until the server left before he spoke, his eyebrow raised in question. “So you’re going to Italy? To do what?”
“To see if we can help,” Finley replied, taking a bite of her food. “ We can’t just leave him there!”
“Umm, I see.” Max sat looking at her for a few moments.
Finley sensed that he wanted to say more so she waited, pausing in her eating as she did.
Max shifted in his seat. “I don’t know how to say this, so excuse me if it comes out wrong, but I need to ask.” He paused again.
“Max, darling, what is it you want to know? Something about this is making you uncomfortable so just say it.”
“Are there unresolved feelings for Grant that are prompting you to go to his rescue?”
Finley sat forward in surprise before recovering herself and responding. “No, dearest, there are no unresolved feelings. And surely not after a decade. Whatever was between Grant and me is long over. It was over before the divorce was finalized.”
“So you are telling me that you would rush across the continent for me, if we hadn’t seen each other since our first encounter in Morocco.”
“Yes, if you were in trouble.”
“Even after I’d hurt you?” Max caught her eye and held it.
Finley softened her gaze and laid her hand over his. ”Yes. Even then, if you had called, I would have come to your aid. I loved you.”
Max took a swig of his wine and held it before swallowing hard. “That is what I’m afraid of.”
“That I still love Grant?” Finley’s voice was soft. “No. I love only you. But I did spend a long time loving him as his girlfriend and then as his wife before you came into my life. We parted for a lot of reasons, one of which was that we stopped loving each other.”
“Okay. But you must admit how irregular this looks.” Max stabbed at his spinach feta omelet while giving her a sideways glance.
She could see that he was not convinced. “However strange it may seem to you, I don’t know what else to do. How would you feel if you were in Grant’s situation and the person you called for help, simply threw up their hands and walked away?”
“First of all, I would have been more judicious in whom I called and secondly, I would have been more explicit in what I wanted them to do.” Max took a bite and stopped chewing to watch her reaction.
“I doubt you would have thought it all out that clearly if you have been on holiday with me and were suddenly accused of murdering me,” Finley suggested. “Going from asking them to help find me to being dragged into a cell facing the noose.”
“Well, Italy doesn’t have the death penalty, but I get your point.”
“I know you think a trip would be a fool’s folly, but my gut says it’s the right thing to do.” Finley said as she passed the rest of her eggs Benedict over for Max to finish. “The best way to settle it is to put it to the court of Mama.”
***
For the rest of their meal and the leisurely walk home, Finley and Max talked about mundane things—getting new cushions for the patio furniture and an article in the Times on the new car models that might be offered later in the year. Finley suggested that they take the long way back to the house, putting her arm in Max’s as she turned to take the path that cut through another row of mews houses before opening onto a green that skirted the back side of their property. It allowed them both time to think.
When they reached home, Max picked up Finley’s phone from her bag and passed it to her. “Call your mother. I’m curious about what she’ll say.”
“I know what she’ll say. ‘Go help the boy out,’” Finley said assuredly. “And Daddy’ll agree.”
Max shook his head. “No way. But whatever their response, will you do what they say? If they say butt out, will you back off and leave it alone?”
“I will ask Daddy to find him a good lawyer and that will be that.”
“And that will be the extent of your involvement?”
“That will be all.” Finley leaned over to kiss him gently. “But if Mama says we need to go, will you likewise abide by her advice?”
Max pulled her closer and kissed her firmly. “Yes, I too will abide. Goodness, I feel like a preacher’s son with all this ‘abiding’.”
Finley wasn’t surprised when Mama picked up on the first ring and turned her camera around so that both she and Daddy were in the frame. “I’d been waiting for you! I just spoke to your sister—and David, of course. They seem to be doing well, even with all the moving around.”
“Hi, Mama. Daddy.” Finley responded, adjusting the phone on the stand so that Max could be seen. “Yeah, Max and I talked to them yesterday. I wanted her to bring some Georgian wine when they came this way for Logan and Hema’s wedding this summer.”
“I am so excited for them. Odessa was a bit put out when she got her invitation.”
“What? Upset that she didn’t snag Logan herself?”
“Of course, darling! What else?”
Finley chuckled at her cousin Odessa, a big-hearted southern woman with an equally large personality who had rarely met a handsome man she hadn’t liked. She especially appreciated the men that Whitt and Finley had chosen as their partners as well as the others that they had brought around to Mama and Daddy’s house over the years. Logan Reynolds had been one of those men who was very FoF—fond of Finley-- until Max staked his claim and Logan found Hema.
“Speaking of men on Odessa’s list, guess who called today?” Finley caught Max’s eye as she spoke. “Grant!”
“Grant, your ex-husband?” it was Daddy who spoke this time. He had never particularly liked Grant. Always thought he was a little stuck up. “Was there something he needed after all this time?”
Finley cleared her throat. “Yes, as matter of fact, there was. He needed help. He’s in jail. In Italy.”
“What, in goodness name?” Mama had drawn back from the screen, her hand moving to her chest, “What is he charged with? Drunkenness? Reckless driving? Whatever it is, you have to help him get out.”
“Murder. Of Blaine, his wife.” Finley waited for the reaction.
Mama’s eyes widened and the hand moved from her chest to her mouth and back again. “Murder? That’s absurd. That boy may be a lot of things, but a murderer he ain’t. He just doesn’t have it in him.”
“I’d have to agree. I never liked him much. More pomp than circumstance, but I wouldn’t think he’s capable of murder.” Daddy scowled. “ Does he have a decent lawyer? How’d you find out all this?”
“As to the lawyer, I don’t really know. I don’t think so. On the finding out, I was his one call! Max talked to the policeman.”
“What did the police say?” Daddy asked, engaging Max through the screen.
“Not much. That Grant and his wife had been traveling in Italy, he had reported her missing and that they now think he killed her, pushed her off the train. He’s being held over in Spoleto.”
Daddy was quiet for a few moments, and Finley and her mama held their tongue while he thought. “Can you get to him, girl?”
Finley turned to look at Max who had failed to mask the surprise on his face. “Yes, we can fly over. I don’t have anything pressing to submit right now and I think Max is in the same boat.”
“Yes, you must go help that poor boy out!” Mama said. “You may be divorced, but he’s still family! His mother and I still exchange cards each Christmas.”
Max took himself out of the camera frame and stared at Finley incredulously. He kept shaking his head in disbelief.
“I don’t ever get a card,” Finley grumbled.
Her mother tsked. “That would be too strange and might put her at odds with the new wife. You have to consider these things. Does his mother know?”
Finley was quick to respond. “No. And I wouldn’t suggest you tell her. I think he called me rather than someone in the States because I was relatively nearby and also because I’m unlikely to know anyone in his current circle. He hasn’t even called the Embassy.”
There was another lag in the conversation that Finley—and now Max—knew she had to wait out. Mama and Daddy would decide the direction she would follow and Max would abide.
