Authors: Patricia Sprinkle

Guess Who's Coming to Die? (34 page)

BOOK: Guess Who's Coming to Die?

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Sheriff Gibbons rose. “I think we have hashed this thing over long enough. The judge and Miss Rachel have been through an ordeal and need to get home. And I need to get over to the police station.” Before he left, he looked across at me. “You’ll come give a statement, too? And you, Miss Ford?”

“Tomorrow,” I promised. “I’m exhausted tonight.”

His eyes twinkled. “Plus you still have some issues at home to resolve.”

I tottered down the stairs holding Walker’s arm, feeling a hundred and two.

Nancy touched my elbow and murmured, “I’m glad you’re okay, Mac.”

“Will you be all right?” I asked in concern.

She gave me a sad smile. “God only knows. Literally. But I’ll do the best I can.” She walked heavily out to her Cadillac SUV, climbed into the seat, and roared down the drive.

“Poor thing.” Sadie Lowe spoke at my shoulder. “Horace has done her dirt, hasn’t he?”

“You might take note of that,” I suggested. “A man who does one woman dirt is likely to do the same again. And you can’t live a lifetime on chemistry, you know.”

Her lipstick was a curved slash of red under the porch light, and I could tell she didn’t think I knew a thing about the kind of chemistry she and Horace had. I saw no need to enlighten her. But as she walked to her car, I felt pity for a child who had never known real love.

Cindy retrieved my pocketbook from the kitchen while Walker offered, “I’ll get your Coke, Mama, but it will be warm by now.”

“I couldn’t care less,” I assured him. “Wet and tingly will be fine.”

Slade and Rachel stood at the bottom of the porch steps with me. “Give me your keys and I’ll bring your car,” Slade offered. “I came with the sheriff, so I need a ride home anyway.”

When Rachel’s gaze followed him, I asked softly, “You like him better now?”

She gave a little sigh. “Yeah. He’s sweet.”

“I can’t understand how he got here, though.”

“I called him. I wanted him to take pictures to support our case. I was telling him what had happened when suddenly everything went black. I guess Wilma hit me.” She touched her bump gingerly. “She must have hung up, too, because he called back and got no answer, so he called the sheriff and asked for a deputy to come with him. When the sheriff heard you were here, too, he decided to come himself and bring several deputies. When they got here, they saw two cars parked out back and found the kitchen door unlocked, so Slade started looking for me while the sheriff went up the front steps for you.”

I gave her a sideways look. “That silence just before you came upstairs sounded a lot like a long kiss. Did you and Slade decide that money isn’t everything?”

“Yeah.” One syllable, a volume of feeling.

“Well, I hope you all will be very happy. You won’t starve. Will you mind staying in Hopemore?”

She gave me a funny look. “Can you keep a secret, Mac?”

“Sure, if I need to.”

She held up her hand so her emerald winked in the porch light. “Remember I told you this was my grandmother’s? Actually, her grandmother gave her a pin when she got married. My mother had the stones made into the earrings and the ring. Grandmother’s maiden name was Willena Kenan, and she grew up in this house. I found lots of pictures of her in the albums. So I have roots in Hopemore.”

I stared. “When did you find that out?”

“Three years ago. Mother used to talk about coming down south with her mother one summer when she was real little, to visit her grandparents. She could remember a big brick house, a cousin John, who was ten, and eating watermelon each afternoon out in the yard. They’d have contests to see who could spit seeds the farthest. That’s all she remembered, except she thought somebody who was her ‘other granddaddy’ lived in a big white house with two porches.”

“But she didn’t know who they were?”

“No, she had no idea where or who those people were. Her mother died when Mother was seven, remember, and her daddy soon married again. When she asked about her mother, he said they’d talk about it when she was older. Unfortunately, he died before he felt she was old enough.”

“And her mother’s family never got in touch with them after her mother died?”

“Apparently not. Mother thought maybe they cast her mother off for marrying a Jew.”

I remembered Wilma saying, “She married a most unsuitable man and died not long after. She was only eighteen.”

“More likely for marrying a Yankee,” I said wryly. “We had Jews in Georgia, but we didn’t have many Yankees back then. But Wilma said she died right after she was married.”

“No, she lived another eight years. When Mother was dying, she wanted to know who her mother’s people were. Mother’s half brother lives out in Seattle, and he has only one son, so Mother hoped maybe her cousin John might still be alive, with children my brother and I could get to know.”

“So how did you find out about the Kenans and Hopemore?”

“I started digging around and turned up the marriage license for Granddaddy and Grandmother, issued in Hope County. Then I checked the phone book and found two W. Kenans living here now. I called and got Wilma, but when I told her I was Willena Kenan’s granddaughter, she accused me of playing a filthy joke and hung up.” Rachel smiled. “I didn’t know about the other Willena, or that she wasn’t married. Mother died soon after that, so I sort of forgot about it. But after Gary got killed, when there was nobody left”—her voice was small in the night, with a catch in her throat—“I decided to come down and check things out. I stayed with Grover and scouted out Hopemore. That’s when I saw the ad for the job, so I decided to interview for it.”

“Did Grover know then about your connection with the Kenans?”

“He still doesn’t. He knows I was looking for ancestors here, but I didn’t tell him the name. They could have turned out to be horse thieves or something, so I didn’t want to tell him until I knew. And then I found him all involved with Willena . . .” She gave an unfunny laugh. “They were almost as bad as horse thieves, weren’t they, Mac?”

“Not all Kenans,” I assured her. “John was a dear, and his daddy and granddaddy. I never cared much for Wilma’s side of the family. They suffered from what I call older-son complex, thinking they are better than others simply because they got born first. But if John had lived, Willena might have turned out differently. Her mother spoiled her once her daddy died.”

“I wanted to get to know her, but I didn’t like to tell her who I was. I didn’t want her to think I was after her money or anything.” Rachel turned back to look at the house, and her face was wistful. “But sometimes I wanted to say, ‘My grandmother grew up in this house.’ ”

I stared at her in astonishment. “That’s what you meant when you said you had a motive?”

She nodded. “I’ve been worried to death somebody would find out and think I’d killed her for her money. It was such a relief to find out she’d left it to Wilma.”

“But she didn’t.” The enormity of the whole thing almost buckled my unsteady knees. “You are going to inherit the whole shebang.” I didn’t give her a chance to protest. “Willena never wrote a will, so as her first cousin, you are her closest living relative.” I chuckled at her dazed expression. “I told Jed he ought to be looking for you. I even told Slade to go looking for you.” I had a sudden thought. “You’re sure he doesn’t know?”

That changed the expression on her face to another kind of dazed. She gurgled. “Positive. He said, ‘Dammit, I never wanted to fall in love with a poor woman. It’s all your fault.’ ”

We looked at each other, started laughing, and could not stop. “I almost wish you didn’t have to tell him,” I said, gasping for breath.

“I won’t,” she cried. “I won’t say a word until after . . . you know, if we decide . . . and then — wham!” She hit a palm with her fist. “Will you keep the secret?”

“Durn tooting,” I agreed, “but tell Jed right away. And don’t put off too long deciding. I just hope you’ll let me be there when you tell Slade. I want to see his face.”

The BMW came around the corner. Slade was peering anxiously through the windshield, but he relaxed when he saw she was laughing. As she climbed in beside him, I saw him take her hand and heard him ask in a tone I’d never heard him use before, “Are you feeling better?”

“Absolutely wonderful,” she agreed.

I will not tell you what happened between Joe Riddley and me when I got home. Early in our marriage we decided we would never fight in front of the children.

I will tell you that since that night, I have felt a special sympathy for prisoners I see cuffed and in leg shackles. Joe Riddley says I’m lucky he doesn’t take a leaf from Wilma’s book and keep me locked in our attic.

Fortunately, we don’t have an attic.

THANKS

Although this book is a work of fiction, I owe a debt of thanks to an unknown toxicologist at a long-ago Sleuthfest for notes I took on mistletoe poisoning by injection, and to Jim and Joyce Lavene, who write delightful herbal mysteries, for pointing me in the right direction to check my facts. I also thank Ros and Mark Breitenbach, the proud owners of an electron blue Corvette, for initiating me into the world of Corvette cruises. And I assure the members of my own Jonquil City Investment Club that it in no way resembles the one in Hopemore, and I did not transplant any of our members to Middle Georgia. Please keep that in mind as I end my own term as senior partner. No corkscrews, please!

“Patricia Sprinkle is the master of the classic cozy mystery.”

—Nancy Pickard

Look for the next Thoroughly Southern Mystery
Featuring Georgia magistrate MacLaren Yarbrough
By bestselling author Patricia Sprinkle
Coming in February 2008 from Signet.

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BOOK: Guess Who's Coming to Die?

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