“That afternoon, I took over her favorite truffles.” The truffles Bethany had savored only minutes before her death. “I thought we could talk, but she only got angry and said she wouldn’t stop. She told me to get out and never come back. She said she was going to change the locks on all the doors and never give me a key.”
In the end all Bethany had left was those truffles. She’d lost her mother, hated her sister, and been seduced by the voice of her godfather. Twenty truffles was all the comfort she could find.
Max looked from the gun, to the dining room door, to the back door. Virginia could shoot her in the back if she made a move in either direction.
With a single tear rolling down her cheek, the woman who had murdered her daughter went on as if Max had asked another question. “I stayed up late baking for her, another of her favorites, apple pie with a flaky butter pastry. I thought if I took it to her ... if we could talk ... but I ran out of sugar. I went over there to borrow some.”
“You took your rolling pin?”
Virginia looked briefly at her grip on the gun. “It was just in my hands.”
Had murder been in her subconscious all along? “Then what happened?” Max wanted answers. She also wanted to keep Virginia talking.
“I heard her with those men. It was horrible. The things she said. Then she started to moan. I couldn’t stand it anymore. I knew she’d never listen to me. I had no choice. I waited until she hung up, and then I ...” She paused, took a deep breath, her lips trembling. “Then I did it.”
The phone rang. Virginia started. The noise stopped on the second ring. It began again. Once, twice. Then silence.
Witt was on his way.
He might be a little bit late.
With only words left as weapons, Max glanced directly at the phone on the wall, then back to Virginia. “That was Ladybird calling. Her son’s on the way. If you kill me, it’s over for you. If you don’t, you might be able to lie your way out of it.”
“It’s all over for me, anyway, Max.” Her eyes misted. “Bud told me that, too.”
Then she raised the gun to her mouth and blew her brains out the back of her head.
*
The front door crashed open. It could have been seconds after Virginia died. It could have been hours. It was certainly long enough for the woman’s body to leak a stark pool of blood all over the white linoleum.
Max had yet to scream. In fact, she had yet to move. She barely turned her head to see Witt framed in the doorway. His gun was out. So was his alien cop look.
She wished he’d hold her. Knew he wouldn’t. Not now. Maybe not ever again. She’d still received one blessing.
Thank you God so very much for proving Horace Long’s prediction false. Witt had not had to kill Virginia to save Max. That was one less thing to have on her conscience.
“Do I need to check the rest of the house?”
More than a procedural question, it was an appeal to her psychic talents. Or maybe the guy trusted her. Nah, she doubted she could be that lucky. “No.”
He holstered his gun beneath his jacket. The ice-blue of his eyes didn’t soften. Max was afraid his belief in her had come too late to mitigate the damage done between them the night before.
It certainly did nothing to explain away the body on the floor.
She kept her eyes on the body, as if it might move, might jump at her, zombie-like, a will beyond its own life.
Witt moved forward, blocking her view of Virginia. He ran his hands up her arms, her throat, his thumbs down between her breasts, then his fingers to span her waist. He could have been checking to see that she was all right. Or he could have been checking her for weapons, the touch was that impersonal. The tremor in his hands gave her hope.
“Did you do that?” he asked, stepping back, his gaze dropping to the floor and then to the gun which had fallen only inches from the curled fingers.
“No.” She didn’t even feel offended that he had to ask. She couldn’t say she felt much of anything.
“Did she confess to killing her daughter before she shot herself?”
“Yes.”
“Do you have a legitimate reason for being here?” His gaze raked her. “This better be more than a one-word answer.”
Funny, coming from him, the king of lean and mean. She almost laughed, but feared she’d never stop. “She wanted me to sit with her until the others got back from the funeral.” The first of many lies she’d have to tell. She couldn’t involve Witt in any cover-up.
“Will Bud Traynor and the girl back you up on that?”
“Yes,” she hesitated, “they will.” Couldn’t risk another one-word answer, especially in the midst of the second lie.
If it was a lie.
If Bud Traynor hadn’t manipulated the whole scenario himself.
The smell rose from the floor, coppery blood and worse. Virginia’s bowels had let loose. The final indignity. Max almost felt sorry for her. In the end, twenty truffles were all Bethany had left, but they were all Virginia had ever had to give. “Do you think we could go outside?”
He led the way out. “Don’t touch anything you haven’t already. Mom called the cops. They should have been here by now.”