Charitable Hearts Read Free Page A

this is incredible.”
    “Thanks. It’s peaceful.”
    “I drove past it like four times trying to find it. How do you even get your mail?”
    Maggie giggled recalling her first mail adventure. “I actually had to stand out at the road and wait for the mail carrier. Like for an entire week.”
    Levi belly-laughed. “I bet.”
    “I’m sorry, would you like something to drink? I have water and a little bit of lemonade left.”
    “Lemonade would be great.”
    Maggie grabbed two glasses and poured them both a drink.
    “So do you always leave the front door open?”
    “Most of the time. I mean, until today, no one had ever just shown up at my house.”
    “Oh, the statements. Hold on.” Levi ran out of the house and came running back in with a stack of papers. He handed them to Maggie, and reached for his glass.
    Her eyes immediately fell on the front page. “Thanks,” she said without looking up. She strolled to her chair and flopped down.
    Levi, still intrigued by the tiny house, kept looking around, amazed at the size. Eventually, he settled himself in the chair opposite her across from the coffee table.
    “Levi, why are your board members making a hundred grand a year for showing up to meetings every other month? And why is your CPA taking two hundred thousand a year? That’s insane. Seven hundred grand a year and these people do little to nothing.” She looked up to find him staring at her completely perplexed.
    “I didn't know.”
    “You didn’t know? You asked them to be on the board, right?”
    “Yeah, but my CPA set it up. He took care of all of it.”
    “Well, they’re the reason your charity is nearly broke. All of your funds are going to people who don’t give a rip about you or your cause.” She suddenly realized she’d been really blunt. “I’m sorry.”
    “It’s okay.” Levi looked completely taken aback. “I really had no idea. I trusted the CPA. He’s been the one donating the money too. Does it say where the money’s going?”
    Maggie flipped the page, scanned it, and continued until she found an answer for him. “You aren’t going to like the answer.”
    Levi leaned forward and frowned. “What?”
    “It’s going to the CF Foundation, but it’s a very small amount.”
    “That’s not what I wanted at all,” Levi said. “Tell me what I need to do.”
    “First thing, you need to fire him and kick all of these people on the board, off. If they don’t want to volunteer, they don’t need to be on the board. The people who do this should love this as much as you do. They should want Amelia’s memory honored just like you do, especially if they care about you at all.”
    “I’m just frustrated with myself. I should have been keeping better track of it. I wanted the money to help people. I thought it was being donated to the hospital where Amelia stayed.”
    Maggie hooked a leg over the arm of her chair and put the papers down on the chair next to her. “Well, what have you been doing? Why didn’t you know? It was right here in the financial statements.”
    Levi didn’t want to answer this question at all. He took a drink of the lemonade to give himself time to answer. “Well, I was filming my show until a few months ago and in between seasons of the show I’ve been a supporting character in a couple of movies.”
    “So, you’ve mostly been dealing with the fun part of it?”
    “Well, yeah, I guess. I mean, the yearly convention is so much fun. I get my friends and their friends to show up, talk to their fans, and the fans pay to get in. There’s contests and photo booths and just all around fun things to do. Last year, we got Bruce McGill to come and it was a record year for donations.”
    Maggie smiled. “That’s impressive, but running a charity is more than just the fun parts. It’s all of it. If you let one thing slip through your fingers, there’s the possibility of someone doing something they shouldn’t.”
    Levi closed his eyes, let out a long breath,