Beads of Doubt (12 page)

“Oh, of course,” I said. I wanted to tell him that I wasn’t
anyone,
but I didn’t. “Well, thanks anyway.” I finished with a wave. I didn’t offer him any additional snacks since he wasn’t cooperating with me.

Through the kitchen window I could see the breakfast table, with several people gathered around it. There was my mother, Beth, Lauren, my brother Stephen, and Nate Wright. Seems I was missing a party.

If Charles hadn’t been guarding the tent I think I’d have backed up and done some primping, but it was too late for that. As they say, plunge ahead anyway, so I did.

“That looks good,” I said as I entered. In the center of the table was a big pot of tortilla soup. “Nate, I’m so sorry I forgot our plans.”

He stood up as I came in. I expected his devil-may-care smile, but instead I saw concern. “Beth said you were at the hospital with a friend. How is she doing? How are you?”

“She’s having a lot of tests, so that’s the first step.”

“And you?”

“I’m fine,” I said. “A little worn, but that could be age more than the day.”

“Never,” he said, pulling out a chair for me. “Your mother was thinking of making soup for herself and we all pitched in.” I noticed that around the soup pot were smaller bowls that held all the fixin’s, such as sliced avocados, grated cheese, tortilla chips, fresh chopped tomatoes, and sour cream.

“It’s wonderful,” Beth said. “You’ll be glad you aren’t going out to dinner.”

My brother was
tsking
at me. “You know, if you carried a Blackberry or an Axim, you wouldn’t forget appointments. You could set an alarm to remind you—”

“If I had one of those,” I said, putting my purse on the counter and taking a chair beside Nate, “I’d spend my life trying to figure out how to make it work.” My arm brushed against Nate’s, and the electricity was so strong I expected to see an arc of light between us.

Stephen already had his Axim out. “Look, I’ll show you. It’s so simple, even you can figure it out.”

“Why, thank you, Stephen.” I rolled my eyes and caught Nate grinning in my direction. It made me think of my first date and how Stephen had done the same kind of thing then. At the time I’d been mortified, and Stephen had been totally unaware of what he’d done. Kind of an innocent Brad Pitt. Always adorable, never quite on this planet. “You can show me the blueberry another time.”

“It’s a Blackberry, only I have an Axim.”

“Stephen, let her eat,” Beth said, handing me a bowl. “She looks tired.”

I ladled soup into it. While I added a small dollop of sour cream and a few chips, my mother patted Nate’s arm, then said to me, “Kitzi, I want to know why you haven’t introduced me to your Mr. Wright before this.”

I’m sure I stuttered before I remembered that Wright was Nate’s last name and my mother wasn’t assuming things about our relationship.

“Uh, he’s, he hasn’t been around much.”

“So I understand, but we’ve enjoyed him so much. And how in the world could you have forgotten a date with him?” She smiled up at Nate. “Our family is partial to charming men, and missing a date with one isn’t something usual.”

“I was a little early,” Nate explained. “I refuse to think I’m that forgettable.”

My mother laughed with delight, and said, “I assure you, even at my age I would never forget you. A handsome man who can also cook is rare.”

“It’s nice that you appreciate my cooking talent. I just call it assembling and heating.”

Stephen was still playing with his handheld computer, Lauren was eating, seemingly stunned by the flirtation between my mother and Nate, while Beth was openly enjoying every second of it.

“I don’t cook at all anymore,” my mother said. “I tell people the kitchen just came with the house.”

Nate smiled. “You know what Katherine Cebrian said. ‘I don’t even butter my bread. I consider that cooking.’ But I think she was an extreme case.”

Mother patted Nate’s arm again. “And you’re erudite as well. Kitzi, you really have to treat Mr. Wright better in the future.”

“I promise I will,” I said.

She nodded. “Good. Now, just to prove that I’m not as pampered as Katherine Cebrian, I am going to contribute something to this meal. I think ice cream is called for. If Kitzi doesn’t have some up here, I do have some in my freezer.”

Nate gave her a crooked smile. “I knew you were the kind of woman who could lead me astray.”

“You can stand a little ice cream,” she said, eyeing him.

Beth laughed and even Lauren appeared to be enjoying the flirtation at this point. I wanted to smile, but I had a sudden vision of Tess, twenty years younger than my mother, alone in a dark hospital room.

The soup suddenly wasn’t very tasty.

The doorbell rang and I jumped up. “I’ll get it.”

“No, I will,” Beth said. “It’s Sergeant Granger.”

Stephen put his handheld away, stood up, and headed toward the back door. “I’d better go.”

“Stephen,” I said, “wait just a minute. I’ll walk you out.” I turned to Nate and said, “I’ll be right back. Don’t let my mother carry you off anywhere.”

Once outside Stephen’s steps grew longer, like he was trying to get away from me.

“Slow down,” I said.

“Kitz, I need to go. I’m meeting Debby.”

“What?! Why in the world—” Which was not a very polite question to be forming, since Debby is his ex-wife and the mother of his one child, my niece, the adorable Lily. “Is Lily okay?”

“Oh, yeah. Sure. She’s fine. She misses not seeing me so much. You know.” He had his hands in his pockets like a kid.

“I can understand that Lily misses you, but that doesn’t explain why you’re meeting Debby.”

He sounded belligerent. “I guess I should just tell you—I’m trying to get us back together. Debby and me.”

“Oh.” I nodded, trying to look interested rather than appalled. “I’m a little surprised. I mean, your divorce has only been final, what, a year? It took forever; I’d think you’d want to enjoy your freedom.” Besides, Debby was never going to be happy with Stephen, at least not until he won a big lottery or fell into a gold mine.

When they’d gotten married, Debby was thrilled to be Mrs. Stephen Camden. At the time Stephen was a wealthy man. However, once she and Stephen had emptied his trust fund and she’d realized no one was going to refill it, she became a very unhappy woman. An uncle on my mother’s side took Stephen in on some real estate investments. Those had kept them going for a while, but then Uncle Jack retired. Then they borrowed money from everyone in the family, and at some point I refused to loan them any more. While that annoyed them both, I think they assumed they could change my mind. I didn’t, and worse, at least in their eyes, I wouldn’t listen to their whining. I thought it was perfectly obvious that both of them needed to get real jobs and cut back on their spending. Debby thought it made more sense for me, or my mother, to keep them.

Debby had perfectly good reasons for thinking we should “help them out”; at least they were good reasons for her.

First, she saw our funds as “family” money. She’s from the what’s-mine-is-mine-and-what’s-yours-is-also-mine school of thought. She also said that Lily wouldn’t have to go to day care if we supported them. I countered that if just one of them would get a full-time job the other could stay home with Lily. Debby said that the job market was tight, she’d been blackballed by some former employer, and Stephen was holding out for a management position. Neither of them seemed to grasp that an employer didn’t just give you a job—you actually had to work.

More than once Debby and I had exchanged some rather pointed words.

Stephen shrugged his shoulders at my comment about his freedom and continued to look toward the driveway. “I’ve had my freedom, now I want us to get remarried.” He turned back to me just long enough to say, “And, Kitzi, I may have to borrow some money from you. I can’t explain, but it’s important. I’ll pay you back.”

Right. “Why do you need money?”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Stephen,” I said, trying my best not to sound exasperated. “This whole thing makes no sense to me.”

“We have a complicated relationship.”

Maybe they did, but I didn’t see how since I was pretty sure that Debby was simpleminded. “Stephen, can we have a talk about this before you go off and do something rash? Say, next week? You come over and I’ll fix your favorite shepherd’s pie, and—”

“Kitzi, it’s not something I want to talk about. It’s . . . well . . . it just is.” He didn’t seem happy with me, but I wasn’t the one who wanted him to remarry a not-very-nice gold digger with claws longer than my cat’s. “I’d better run.”

“No,” I said. “Give me just five minutes. I have to tell you what’s happening—”

“I can’t. Not now. Maybe later.” And with that he took off toward his car at a lope. I hadn’t even gotten to tell him about Houston’s bid to take over the Manse.

I could feel myself getting angry. Stephen was adorable, but that cuter-than-thou appearance didn’t hold up for long in the grown-up world. If he couldn’t find a job, Stephen could at least focus long enough to be of some help to me. He knew the entire family, and he cared about the Manse. Not as much as I did, but his incentive would be Mother—he did love her.

I walked back into the house wishing I had a wand that I could wave to make everything the way I wanted it. I might even use it to smack a few people around. On the driveway near the front door was a rather nondescript white car. That would be Sergeant Granger’s, which meant it was time to talk to him about Andrew’s death.

My anger was giving way to sorrow. No matter what I thought of Andrew, he was young with a major portion of his life still in front of him. And there was Tess, younger than I was, in her hospital room. There was so much to lose in life. It didn’t seem right or fair.

In the dark hallway I stopped and leaned against the wall. Sometimes things are just hard. I put my hands over my face. The stupid house could go—I would gladly give it away if someone would find a cure for ovarian cancer now, soon enough to save Tess. She had looked so terrible. So weak, and just not herself. I felt like someone had thrown a javelin through my heart and I wanted to cry to wash out the pain, but no tears would come.

Maybe I didn’t have anything to cry about. I was healthy; I would survive. It was Tess and others like her who should be crying, but they were the brave ones. I pressed on my eyes with the palms of my hands until I saw spots. Sometimes life just pissed me off.

I felt hands on my shoulders and I opened my eyes in surprise. Nate was watching me.

“Hi,” I said.

“Hi, yourself. Are you okay?”

“Oh sure.” I let out a long breath. “Nothing but a few little bumps on the road of life. Isn’t that what the poets say to expect?”

“That and they like to talk about rain. Into each life a little must fall.”

I straightened up. “That’s probably in the forecast since I seem to have black clouds following me around.”

He smiled and kissed me lightly on the nose. After a pause he said, “Now I have to give you bad news. Sergeant Granger wants to talk with you.”

“More fun,” I said.

“When your interview is finished, how about if I buy you a drink? Or some dessert?”

“Either,” I said as he wrapped an arm around my shoulders and steered me toward the kitchen.

As we walked through the doorway together, Lauren looked up from the sink and blushed. “Oh.” She looked embarrassed, but then she’s young. She said, “I’m sorry. I was going to clean up . . .”

“It’s okay. Never apologize for doing someone else’s work,” I said.

“I’ll help,” Nate offered. To me he added, “You’d better go see the sergeant. Do you want to take anything with you?”

“Cyanide?” I asked.

“I was thinking more of tea or coffee, or maybe a glass of wine.”

“That’s okay,” I said. “Oh, I did offer the sergeant some food earlier.”

“Beth took him some.”

“Then I’m on my way.”

The sergeant was in the small downstairs office, a tape recorder in his hand. It’s a room of navy and oak, dominated by the huge antique desk that had been my grandfather’s. Dwayne Granger wasn’t exactly sitting behind it; he was at the side, using it to hold one of my Mexican trays with his bowl of soup and a plate of crackers. The bowl was almost empty. He also had a pen and a notebook.

Beth was sitting on a loveseat across from Granger and they were both smiling. When Beth saw me her expression changed to concern. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” I said. “Bad day and it caught up with me.”

Beth nodded and patted my arm. “I’m sorry.” Then she turned to the sergeant. “Go easy on her, okay?”

He raised his eyebrows. Beth left the room, and I had to wonder what I’d missed. That wasn’t a remark I’d expect from Beth to a police officer.

“Ms. Camden, would you be seated?” he began.

Once before I’d had to give a formal interview to the police, only then I was holding things back to cover up for Beth’s daughter Shannan. This time I was ready to tell the detective anything and everything he wanted to know. I was even going to tell him things he wasn’t expecting.

First he asked if I minded the tape recorder, which I didn’t. Then he wanted my full name and address. Next he read me my rights, which surprised the hell out of me.

“Am I a suspect?” I asked.

He smiled and did a small wave in the air. “Primarily I’m asking for information to help us find the person or persons who killed Andrew Lynch; however, you still have the same rights under the law. You don’t have to speak to me without an attorney present.” I suspected that was something he’d said many times before.

“No thanks. My attorney, Howard Voelkman, is probably asleep in front of the TV set about this time, and we wouldn’t want to disturb him. He wouldn’t be near as comfortable sleeping in a chair here.”