Ida Belle and Gertie fell silent, and I knew their minds were rolling through the citizens of Sinful, trying to figure out which one of them had been hiding a dark side from the entire town.
“Hey,” I said, “did either of you look at Gail’s Facebook page?”
They both shook their heads.
“It didn’t even occur to me,” Ida Belle said. “Surely she wouldn’t have corresponded openly with the man or even been friends with him.”
“Let’s check,” I said, and brought up Gail’s page. I scrolled down to her wall. Another dead end. She hadn’t posted in six months.
“If she’s never on her page,” I said, “how would she know if someone sent her a private message?”
“If she had notifications set up,” Gertie said, “she would have gotten an email at whatever address she indicated.”
I closed my laptop. “Then I guess that’s how he did it. But we still don’t know why he would have zeroed in on Gail in the first place. The other women were single and a bit older.”
“Maybe because Nolan is disabled?” Ida Belle suggested. “He might have thought she found her life less than what she wanted, which was apparently true.”
“And she ran a charity,” Gertie said, “so he might have figured she’d be a soft touch for cash.”
My cell phone went off and I started, then pulled it from my pocket. It was Carter.
I can be there in 15. Does that work?
“What’s wrong?” Gertie asked. “Your face got that pinched look like when I make you wear that push-up bra.”
I didn’t want to go into it all. Not now. But I didn’t see any way to get them out of my house without telling them the truth.
“I ran into Carter at the shooting range yesterday. He wanted to come by tonight and talk with me.”
Gertie perked up. “Maybe he’s come to his senses.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “He said he felt he owed me a better explanation of why he couldn’t be with me.”
Ida Belle scowled. “I agree with that much, but in the big scheme of things, what difference does it make?”
“It doesn’t,” I said.
“But you want to know,” Gertie said.
“Damn it, I do.” I blew out a breath. “Why can’t I just let this go?”
“Because you care for him,” Gertie said simply. “When is he coming over?”
“Fifteen minutes,” I said, “assuming I give him the go-ahead.”
Ida Belle rose from the chair arm. “Do it. Maybe whatever he has to say will help you let go. Maybe it won’t. But he does owe you better than what you got. We’ll get out of here. Call us if you need anything.”
I nodded and replied to his text.
Sure.
Then wondered what I’d just opened myself up to.
Chapter 14
Carter pulled up in my driveway exactly fifteen minutes after his first text. Gertie had insisted I have a shot of cough syrup to steady my nerves, but I didn’t think it had done much good. It confused me how a simple conversation with someone who wasn’t a physical threat had me more nervous than being undercover and talking to a target.
He’s an emotional threat.
I sighed and went to open the door. That was the only threat I wasn’t trained to deal with.
He walked in quietly, almost hesitant, and it hit me that he was nervous too. That was something, at least, and it did make me feel a tiny bit better.
I headed back for the kitchen. I thought whatever he had to say would be easier with a table in between us, and it gave my arms somewhere to rest instead of hanging limp at my sides. Even better would be if I had something to drink, so I went straight for the refrigerator.
“Do you want a beer?” I asked.
“That would be great,” he said, and gave me a grateful look as he took a seat at the table.
I opened two beers and sat across from him. He looked tired and something else, sad maybe? I wondered if that was because of me or because of the case.
“You look beat,” I said, breaking the unbearable silence.
“I am,” he said. “I would never admit this to Mom, but I don’t think I’m a hundred percent.”
“A concussion can take a long time to completely heal. And you haven’t really given it a good rest.”
“I know, but lately, there doesn’t seem to be time for rest. It’s like this entire town has turned upside down.” He looked down at his beer bottle and tapped his finger against it. “This is exactly the sort of thing I was trying to avoid by coming back here…things like this murder.”
I nodded. Carter had told me the reason he came back to Sinful when he left the Marine Corps was because he thought it would be as far removed from the things he’d seen in Iraq as he could get. Unfortunately, it wasn’t working out that way.
“But surely,” I said, “crime happens everywhere.”