Amanda wanted to revert to her old rebellious days, flip off her aunt, and curl up back on the sofa with the picture for the rest of the day. But she’d promised Jesus when she accepted him into her heart that she would put her wild ways behind her, and so far she’d kept her word. Besides, Conrad had told her repeatedly how much he loved her sweet goodness and that she was going to make a wonderful mother to their son. She could not let him down, not even if it meant eating food that would taste like sawdust.
“I want to start my maternity leave next weekend,” she said.
“Fine by me, but you are not holing up in this place with the curtains pulled and the lights turned off,” Aunt Ellie said.
“I’m going to the cabin. Conrad said he was leaving it to me, and I can spend time on the deck looking out over the lake. We were supposed to go up there next week anyway. I think I can find closure there. Maybe I’ll even stay longer,” Amanda said.
“I can agree with that,” Aunt Ellie said. “But a week before the baby’s due date, you should come on home. Your doctor is here.”
“And I will make all my appointments.” She laid a hand on her baby bump. “I’ll take good care of this little guy. That’s the least I can do for Conrad.”
Waylon arrived in Wichita Falls right at noon, so he stopped at a pizza place advertising an all-you-can-eat buffet and had lunch. He’d found out this morning that the florist had no idea where Conrad was taking the dozen yellow roses he’d bought that day. He hadn’t signed a card before he was slain. He had only just been in the process of paying for the roses, which he’d had in his hands when the two men in masks burst through the door and shot him.
Mr. Drummond, the florist, let Waylon look at the record of Conrad’s purchases. At least once a week for the past three months, he’d bought yellow roses on Thursday. In the past year, he usually bought flowers right after the first of the month, and that order varied from daisies to orchids. The store owner was too eager to help, which meant he was probably hiding something big. Waylon made a note to call him later or go back to see him in a week or so. Maybe he’d deleted a couple of orders to protect someone?
Waylon couldn’t manage to keep one wife at a time happy. How in the hell did Conrad keep three on the hook and still have time to buy flowers for other women? He had to have had a date book or a calendar somewhere. Waylon made a note to go through all the evidence they’d found in his van. He had to be a smart man, so he would not have kept it in any of the three wives’ houses. The only other place it could be was in his van, with that load of clothing he was peddling across the state. If he didn’t find it in the evidence boxes, he’d tear apart the van, one piece at a time.
He snagged the last parking space in front of Ellie’s Boutique that afternoon. He left his cowboy hat and sunglasses in the car but pasted on a big smile when he opened the door.
“Whew, it’s a hot one. This cool air feels good.” He spotted a lady with two little girls looking at children’s clothing in one area and an older woman flipping through hangers on the other side of the store.
“What can I do for you?” the woman who’d been sitting beside Amanda at the funeral asked. “You look familiar. Have we met?”
“Yes, ma’am, we have. At Conrad Steele’s funeral. I am Detective Waylon Kramer.” He showed her his badge. “I came to talk to Amanda, if she’s available.”
The woman crossed her arms over her chest. “She’s not.”
Amanda rounded the end of a rack of clothing. “I’m right here, and I have questions for you, Detective. Follow me back to the office.” She led the way past the checkout counter and into a small room, where she pointed at an old straight-back wooden chair. “Have a seat right there. Would you like a soft drink or a cup of coffee? We’ve got both.”
“Something cold would be nice.” Waylon sat down in a chair that was more uncomfortable than the sofa in Kate’s fancy office.
Amanda took a Pepsi from a small refrigerator and twisted the lid off before handing it to him. “Did you find out who killed my Conrad?”
“Not yet.”
“Then why are you here?” she asked.
“I need a play-by-play of where you were all day Thursday,” he said.
“Good Lord! I didn’t kill him. I wouldn’t. I couldn’t. I love him.” She threw a hand over her forehead in a dramatic gesture. “I would never”—her eyes welled up with tears that spilled down over her cheeks—“kill the father of my baby.” She reached for a tissue and dabbed at her face. “And if you do your job, you’ll find that he divorced those other two women.”
“We’ve been looking into that since his death. It appears that there are records of him marrying all three of you, but no divorces on file. Could you please just tell me where you were on Thursday?”
She pointed down at her stomach. “Did either one of those masked people who shot my Conrad have a belly like this?”
“They did not,” he answered.
“Okay, then, take me off the suspect list. How could I? And I have dozens of people who were in and out of this store all day Thursday who will testify that I never left the place. Opened at nine and didn’t close until after five that day. We had a pre–Independence Day sale going on,” she said. “Besides, it’s three hours to Dallas. There’s no way I could have gone there and come back without being missed.”