Center Stage: Magnolia Steele Mystery #1 (13 page)

He closed the distance between us in milliseconds. Grabbing my upper arm hard enough to hurt, he tugged me closer. The liquid in my wine glass sloshed out onto my hand. “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll keep your mouth shut.”

I steeled my jaw. I’d be damned if I’d let him know his intimidation was working. “I think Maddie would love to know about Ashley Pincher blowing you behind my house the night of our graduation.”

He leaned even closer, his face inches from mine, and I could smell beer on his breath. “Don’t mess with me, Magnolia. Things are different now. You don’t belong here, so do yourself a favor and get the hell out of town before something happens that you’ll regret.”

“Are you threatening me, Blake?”

The hinges on the back door squeaked, and Blake immediately dropped his hold and took a step back.

“There you are, Magnolia,” Belinda said, sounding relieved. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere.” She started to walk toward us, but stopped in her tracks when she caught sight of Blake. “I’m sorry. I hope I didn’t interrupt anything.”

“No,” Blake said good-naturedly. “Magnolia and I were just catching up.” Sliding up to me, he wrapped an arm around my back and cupped my upper arm. “Me, Maddie, and Magnolia were all good friends in high school. I was one of the people who searched the woods for her the night she disappeared.”

The light from the kitchen window cast dark shadows on Belinda’s face, but the way her eyes widened with surprise made me wonder if she knew anything about that night.

Blake dropped his arm. “You ladies go on and wrap things up so I can go inside. Too much estrogen flowing in there right now.”

I was torn between telling him off and running away—but my fear won out. I bolted for my sister-in-law, trying to ignore the shame burning in my gut for taking the chicken’s way out.

I walked past Belinda, eager to get as far away from Blake as possible. She cast a glance over her shoulder back at him, then followed me inside.

Sydney was in the middle of announcing the winners when we walked in. “. . . and now the award for the most losses. Who had two?” Half of the ladies in the room lifted a hand. “Three? Four? Six?” She continued calling out numbers until she finally found a winner.

I drained the last of the sangria pitcher and gulped it down, ignoring the scrutiny of my sister-in-law. I flashed her a forced smile. “Who knew Bunco could make you so thirsty?”

I tried to drown out Sydney’s voice as she went through several more categories, handing out candles and gift cards for the most wins, the fewest Buncos, then finally the most Buncos. The conversation swelled up again, but Sydney raised her voice over the murmurs.

“We have one more award to give out.”

Several of the guests looked confused, but Sydney pressed on. “And the prize for the person with the most nerve goes to Magnolia Steele for daring to show her face here tonight.”

The murmuring stopped and all eyes turned to me.

I’d spent a couple of hours with these women, and while everyone knew about my bad luck on stage, most had no idea I’d skipped town a decade ago.

Maddie’s mouth dropped open and her face went pale. It was obvious she had nothing to do with her friend’s announcement.

“That’s right,” Sydney said, taking a step forward and wobbling to the side. “Magnolia Steele.” She spat out my name like it was a mouthful of rotten fish. “Who destroyed so many lives, yet blows back into town like a spring wind.” Her gaze landed on me, her gaze slightly unfocused. “Like a fucking tornado that rips lives apart.”

Several of the women gasped.

Maddie’s eyes glistened with tears as I looked on in horror. I should never have come—to Bunco, to Momma’s, to Franklin.

Belinda bustled up to me and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “I don’t know about y’all, but I think Maddie’s delicious white wine sangria must have snuck up on Sydney.” Then she turned to Maddie. “Thank you for a wonderful evening, but Magnolia and I need to be leaving.”

Belinda—ever prepared—had already grabbed her purse and jacket. Since I hadn’t brought anything, she flashed her sweet smile at everyone and dragged me out the door and all the way to her car. But she didn’t stop until she opened the passenger door and proceeded to push me in.

I took a step back. “Belinda, I’m perfectly capable of getting into a car by myself.”

“You had more than a few glasses of sangria yourself, and since at least a dozen pairs of eyes are on you at the moment, I thought it best that you not fall on your keister.”

“Keister?”

She ignored my comment. “You getting in?”

“Remind me not to get on your bad side.”

She flashed an innocent smile that suddenly didn’t look so innocent.

We were silent all the way home, until Belinda pulled into Momma’s driveway. She put the car in park and turned to face me. “You don’t have anything to be ashamed of, Magnolia.”

I released a short laugh. “There are so many people who would disagree with that statement, my own mother included.” I tipped my head toward the house.

“Just hang in there. Before you know it, people will stop talking and move on to something else. They always do.”

Without another word, I climbed out and headed for the front door, grumbling to myself that I didn’t have a house key. When I pulled out my phone to text my mother to let me in, I found a text waiting for me.

Secrets don’t make friends
.

A blocked number again. My head grew faint, and I almost fell over my knees, but I had to hold it together or Belinda would charge out of the car and pepper me with questions. The text could have been from half a handful of women at that party. Or Blake.

That one gave me pause. He’d admitted he knew I was back. He could have easily sent the first text.

Belinda was watching me like a mother hen, so I gave her a wave and blindly reached for the door handle, surprised and frightened to find the door unlocked. Had Momma left it that way, or had something more nefarious occurred? My heart pounding in my chest, I pushed the door open, but a folded piece of paper on the entryway table caught my eye before I could shout for Momma. It was a note from her, telling me she’d gone to bed early and left the door open for me.

Confusion followed my initial feeling of relief. Gone to bed early? It was barely past ten o’clock. Momma had always been a night owl.

Tossing the note down, I latched the deadbolt and pressed my hand against the steel, letting myself savor the solid feeling of it. This door gave me a false sense of security that would undoubtedly bite me in the ass.

I had so much bigger things to worry about besides women gossiping about my troubles. Or even the pain and betrayal in Maddie’s eyes.

What did Blake know about ten years ago? Did I dare ask him?

There was no doubt that coming back to Franklin was a mistake, but I wasn’t sure what to do about that now. I was good and stuck until my name was cleared.

When I reached my room, I opened the nightstand drawer and touched Daddy’s gun. Once my name was cleared, I was leaving again.

And I was never coming back.

M
y sleep was fitful
, my dreams a jumbled mess. Blake shouting my name. Running away from him in the rain. And the blood. But there was something new this time. A house in the woods, with peeling paint and broken windows, the inside empty and littered with trash. A basement, dark and dank. Fear so sharp it burned my entire body as it shot through my veins. A dripping sound.

Drop. Drop. Drop
.

A puddle of blood.

I bolted upright in bed, my heart beating so fast I wondered if I was having a heart attack. I reached over and turned on the lamp to illuminate the pitch-black room.

While I’d returned home that night years ago with a splitting headache and a giant goose egg on the side of my head, the only injury that could have bled was the cut on my thigh, and there was no way it could have bled that much. So whose blood had it been?

It took me hours to get back to sleep, so I was none too thrilled when Momma flung my door open and strode into the room. Within minutes she was throwing open the curtains and letting sunlight flood into the room.

“Rise and shine, Magnolia. Time to get to work.”

“What time is it?”

“Eight o’clock.”

Releasing a groan, I rolled over and buried my face into my pillow. Mainlining sangria had seemed like a wonderful solution to my problems last night. This morning, not so much.

My covers were ripped off me next. “I swear, you haven’t changed at all. Get up.”

If only her statement were true. I
wished
I were the same girl.

“I’m twenty-eight years old, Momma. You don’t need to wake me up in the morning.”

“That’s not true if you don’t get out of bed in the morning on your own. Now get up and get ready. You have things to do.”

I sat up, suddenly leery. “You’re not making me waitress at your event tonight, are you?”

She snorted. “Good God, no. It’s a small dinner—twenty people—so my experienced staff can handle it. Besides, after Luke Powell’s party, there’s no way I’d put you out in public.”

“So what do you want me to do?”

“This morning? It may be a weekend, but you’re cleaning. Then later you can work in the kitchen.”

I groaned and flopped down on the bed. “Momma. I have a headache as big as Texas. Let me sleep another ten minutes.”

“I’ll see you
in the kitchen
in ten minutes,” she said, stomping toward the door. “And I expect you to be dressed and ready to clean, or I’m going to tack fifty bucks on to your rent.”

She hadn’t yet told me how much I owed in rent or how much I was getting paid, but I knew her well enough to know she wasn’t bluffing. Ten minutes later, I was dressed in a short-sleeved T-shirt and a pair of yoga pants, guzzling a half-empty cup of coffee in the kitchen. I’d already chased the first few sips with a couple of ibuprofens. Momma emerged from the laundry room with a plastic tote of cleaning supplies.

“This is a spring cleaning. Baseboards. Windows. The whole shebang. You can get started on this floor, and I’ll work upstairs.”

I spent the rest of the morning cleaning while I listened to the soundtrack from
Waitress
on my phone, occasionally dancing and singing along. I needed something to distract me from all the anxious thoughts running through my head on repeat. If Detective Holden was determined to put me behind bars, then I had to work twice as hard to stay out. Too bad I didn’t know the first thing about getting out of murder charges.

I was mopping the dining room when someone tapped my shoulder. After my initial reaction of shock—jumping and screaming in place—I ripped my ear buds out and wielded the mop as a weapon.

Emily lifted her hands and took several steps backward, fear in her eyes. “Whoa. Don’t whack me.”

I lowered the mop and took a deep breath. “Sorry. You scared me.”

“Obviously.” She put a hand on her chest. “Who on earth did you think I was?”

“Nobody,” I grumbled, hating that I’d made myself look suspicious. No wonder that asshole Blake had sent me another text. I might not remember what happened, but he didn’t know that. I
had
entertained the idea that it might not have been him. I’d spent half the morning trying to figure out if someone at the party might have sent it. But too many drinks had made my memory fuzzy.

Brilliant, Magnolia. You’re under suspicion for murder, not to mention in possible danger, and you’re getting sauced on girly drinks. What an idiot
.

I turned around, plopped the mop into the bucket, and then wrung it out. I had hours of work to do. “Momma’s upstairs cleaning her bathroom.”

“Actually I’m here to see you.”

There could only be one reason for that. I slowly turned back around. “They’re about to arrest me.”

“No. In fact, your fingerprints weren’t found on the letter opener.”

“I already knew that. That means they should leave me alone now, right?”

“Actually . . .” She looked over her shoulder, and I noticed my mother was standing at the bottom of the stairs, listening. The dark circles under her eyes made her look more exhausted than a few hours cleaning should have made her. “I’d like Lila to be part of this.”

“Let’s go into the kitchen,” Momma said, already disappearing around the corner.

She started a fresh pot of coffee and cut each of us a slice of coffee cake, refusing to discuss anything until we were all sitting at the breakfast room table.

Emily picked up her fork and gave me a long hard look. “Like I said, your fingerprints aren’t on the letter opener.” When I started to say something, she held up the fork and cut me off. “But there’s more.” She broke off a piece of her cake and stuffed it into her mouth, releasing a satisfied moan that would be more appropriate to her bedroom than my mother’s table.

Impatient, I finally asked, “What more could there be?”

“Your prints aren’t on there, but no one else’s were either.”

I cocked my head. “What does that mean for me?”

Emily lifted her gaze to my mother’s. “Nothing good.” She picked up her coffee and blew on the surface. “It means that whoever killed him must have wiped off the prints. Which means you are still their number one suspect.”

“So they’re gonna arrest me?”

“Holden will try to build a stronger case first. But, yeah. They’re going to arrest you. It’s a matter of
when
it’s going to happen.”

“So I’m just supposed to sit here and wait for it to happen?” I couldn’t help but remember what Colt had told me about his friends. Escape was starting to sound like a pretty good option. Was Bora Bora a non-extraditing country? I’d worked out enough for my role in
Fireflies at Dawn
to look good in a bikini. At least I had
that
going for me.

“You have to fight it,” Belinda said from behind me.

I spun around in surprise. From her mint green dress to her soft pink cardigan and matching flats, my sister-in-law looked like she had come straight from a sorority house. The ivory Coach purse hanging from her shoulder only added to the effect. Her strawberry blonde hair was pulled back into a ponytail, making her look all of twenty-two.

“How long have you been standing there?” For some bizarre reason, I didn’t want her to know I was a person of interest in the murder case. I liked the way I looked through her eyes, and I didn’t want her to see me as everyone else did.

“Long enough to know you’re in trouble.” She walked over and sat in the empty seat next to me. She looked over at Emily and Momma with a no-nonsense face. “This is about that talent agent’s murder, isn’t it?”

Momma’s eyes widened in surprise.

I’d been amazed that she hadn’t quizzed me about it last night, after finding out about the murder, but there hadn’t exactly been a lot of quiet moments at Bunco.

“It’s not much of leap, Lila,” Belinda said, shaking her head a little. “I know you and Tilly catered Luke Powell’s party, and that talent agent was murdered there.”

“But why would you jump to the conclusion that I was a suspect?” I asked.

She gave a half shrug. “That doesn’t seem like the issue to me. The real issue is how you’re going to fight it.”

Emily gave me a look that suggested she wasn’t going to say another word unless I wanted her to proceed.

“Why are you doing this, Belinda?” I asked. “How do you know I didn’t do it?”

“Because you’re a good person, Magnolia Steele.”

I expected my mother or Emily to protest or smirk, but both of them remained surprisingly quiet.

“And besides, you’re part of my family. And family sticks together.”

I had to wonder what kind of family she’d been raised in to believe that. My brother sure wasn’t here to support me. I hadn’t even heard from him since I’d called him. Her support wasn’t coming from him.

Belinda leaned over and settled her hand over mine. “But if I’m going to help, I need to know what’s going on.”

I glanced at Emily, but she looked uncertain.

Belinda had been more than helpful last night, which led me to the crazy idea that she might be able to help after all. So I took a deep breath and then told her everything—about Max Goodwin, the party, and even my interrogation at the police station the day before, though I left out the part about Emily freezing up. Emily’s shoulders sank with relief when she realized I wasn’t going to rat her out.

When I finished, Belinda turned her sharp gaze to Emily. “Are there any other suspects?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, can’t you find out?” She sounded like a prim and proper schoolmarm.

Emily’s face hardened. “The police won’t tell me anything, but I do plan on checking out a couple of suspects. Lisa Huddleston’s husband is in the industry, although on the Christian side. Last night she mentioned a couple of people who had motive.”

“You mean the country singer and the vice president of Highway 24 Music?” I asked. “I wouldn’t know the first thing about how to contact the vice president.”

“Well, good thing for you I have an in,” Emily said, looking smug. “Daddy knows Henry McNamara, the VP. They started out together back in the day.”

Well, crap. Why hadn’t I thought about that? Emily’s father was an executive for a country label.

“See?” she said, holding my gaze. “I’m a good defense attorney.”

My mother shot me a glare. “Were you insulting Emily’s abilities?”

“No!” I gave Emily a look of disbelief, half-tempted to tell Momma the truth. It wasn’t like I owed Emily a damn thing. But I couldn’t do it. Standing in my own spotlight of humiliation, I felt no need to tug her under the glare.

But Emily didn’t know that. “No. It was just a bad joke,” she said, giving my mother a grim smile. “Magnolia’s been a model client.”

Momma didn’t look so convinced, but let the subject drop.

“What about the singer? Paul Locke?” Belinda asked. “Can you contact him?”

Emily cringed. “That might prove to be more difficult. Daddy’s my contact, and Paul Locke is under contract with another label. He can’t reach out to him.”

“I might have another way,” Belinda said and gave me a grin. “Amy.”

“Who?” Emily asked.

“Amy is Luke Powell’s personal assistant,” Momma said. “She and Belinda were roommates when they first moved to Nashville.”

“Oh.”

“Amy was in charge of the guest list,” Belinda said, clasping her fingers together on the table. “She’ll know how to contact him. She’ll also know who else might have had a reason to kill him.” She gave a tiny shudder.

Looking lost in thought, Emily turned toward Momma. “Did the police ask you for a guest list?”

“No,” Momma said. “But I didn’t have one. Just a head count, which wasn’t accurate anyway, so there’s a good chance Amy’s list isn’t complete.”

“There’s only one way to find out,” Belinda said as she opened her purse and fished out her phone. She quickly pulled up a number and held the phone to her ear. “Hey, Amy, how are you? … No. I heard all about the murder. I’m so sorry. How are you holding up? … I know, but surely he can’t hold you accountable.”

Momma gave me a nod before she took a sip of her coffee.

Belinda was silent for a moment, her face scrunching up as she listened intently to the woman on the other line. “I’d love to see you. Maybe I can help. Can you meet for lunch this afternoon? I know it’s short notice … Great. How about that new restaurant on Cool Springs Boulevard—Austin’s? Great. See you then.”

She gave me an assessing look as she ended the call. “You need a shower,” she announced.

“Excuse me?”

“We’re going to lunch, and you need a shower. You’re a beautiful girl, Magnolia, but that ponytail looks like a rat built a nest in it and is coming back to hibernate for six years.”

My mouth dropped open in shock, but I quickly recovered and shook my head. “I suspect Luke Powell’s assistant does
not
want to see me.” Especially after our experience together after Max’s murder. “Maybe you better go alone.”

“Nope. You’re coming.” She returned the phone to her purse and stood. “I’ll be back at 12:40 to pick you up. Make sure you’re ready.” Then she walked out the door, leaving the three of us speechless.

“I had no idea she had it in her,” I said. “She seems so sweet and unassuming.”

Momma shook her head with a look of pride. “And that’s one reason she’s so good at her job. Sure, she creates beautiful weddings, but it’s how she handles things once they’re in progress that gets her referrals. She’s what you would get if Mary Poppins had a drill sergeant’s baby. She keeps people in line without them even realizing they’re being bossed around.”

Emily stood. “So Belinda and Magnolia will talk to Luke Powell’s assistant, and I’ll have Daddy get me Henry McNamara’s number.”

“What am I supposed to do?” Momma asked.

I gave her a long look. She looked even more tired than she had earlier in the morning. I knew my predicament had to be hard on her, and I felt guilty all over again for coming back to town. But I knew my mother better than to point any of that out. “I think you should stay here and be home base. We’ll all check back with you.”

“I have to get to the kitchen by three.”

I gave her a half-shrug. “Then we’ll check in with you there.”